


Here Comes the Sun

by Fornavn, fuzzballsheltiepants



Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: Alternate Universe - Horse Racing, Assistant Trainer!Dan, Horse Racing, Horse Trainer!Wymack, It comes with the job, Jockey!Andrew, Jockey!Neil, M/M, Neil's first love is a horse, Strangers to Friends to Lovers, There's a lot of horses in this, They're jockeys, Unhealthy Dieting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-04
Updated: 2019-03-21
Packaged: 2019-11-12 02:37:41
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 32,832
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18002213
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fornavn/pseuds/Fornavn, https://archiveofourown.org/users/fuzzballsheltiepants/pseuds/fuzzballsheltiepants
Summary: Neil was a child when his mother ripped him away from the only creature in the world he loved, his pony, JJ.  Now ten years later, injured and desperate, he finds refuge in the stall of a racehorse.  He ends up on a new track he never could have predicted, with an unexpected prize waiting for him at the finish line: hope.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> It has been an honor to be a part of the Reverse Big Bang, especially to get to write for [Fornavn's](https://fornavn.tumblr.com) incredible art and prompt. A huge thank you to my beta, Nicole @tntwme, for keeping me on task and walking me through writer's block, and to Niko @nikothespoonklepto for being my cheerleader and talking me off a cliff more than once. Most of all, thanks to Gabriella for organizing this and being amazing from start to finish!

Glossary:

Filly - Female horse under the age of 4

Colt - Male horse under the age of 4, usually implies has not been gelded (castrated)

Gelding - Castrated male horse of any age

Mare - Female horse over the age of 4

Stallion - Uncastrated (intact) male horse over the age of 4

Tapit - one of the top producing Thoroughbred stallions in the country

Pony - In normal equine parlance, a pony is just a short horse (under 14.2 hands, or about 58") at the withers (where the neck joins the body).  However, in this context, "ponying" means using one horse to lead another, so a "pony horse" or "lead pony" is the horse who does that

Farrier - a person who shoes horses

Breeze - A fast gallop used in training for racing

Claiming race - A race in which there is a set price for the horses running in it, and people can put a “claim” in where they agree to buy the horse at the end.

Handicap - A race where the weight a horse carries is assigned by a person based on the horses’ previous performances to try to level the field

Stakes race - The upper tier of horse races with the highest purses and the best horses.  Can be Graded 1, 2, or 3, or ungraded.

Allowance race/Starter Allowance - A step up from a claiming race, but not as elite as a stakes race.

Maiden - a horse who has never won a race.  “Breaking their maiden” means they won their first race.

Place - to come in second

Show - to come in third

Blinkers - a hood that horses wear with cups that block some of their peripheral vision.  Helps some horses run faster.

Lasix - a medication, legal in some states, given to racehorses to enhance performance.  It is a diuretic, and may reduce the tendency of certain horses to have bleeding in their lungs when they run at maximal speed.

* * *

Horse barn names/jockey club names:

Queenie/Raven Queen

Percy/Lightning Thief

Piggy/Donut Tell Daddy

Kona/OverlyCaffeinated

Whisper/Tellmeyoursecrets

Mag/Animagus

Kacy/Chikhu Kacy Jace

Snookie/Pongo Havoc

Vinnie/Vincent Van Go

* * *

The footsteps were getting closer.

Neil curled himself into a tighter ball, counting on the dull dark gray of his hoodie to help him blend in to the dark trees.  A flashlight beam flickered through the woods, soon joined by a second.

“Junior,” that hated voice called out in a sing-song parody of a children’s game.  “Come out, come out, wherever you are.”

He didn’t move, was barely breathing, as the crunching of leaves got louder.  One arm pressed against the fresh wound on his abdomen, hoping the blood wouldn’t drip down and give him away.  

“I bet he climbed the fence.”  Romero’s voice came from behind Neil, not more than three yards away.  Neil suppressed his flinch; it seemed incredible they couldn’t hear his rabbit-fast heart, given how loud it was pounding in his own ears.

“No way, not with the wound I gave him,” Lola countered.  “He’s somewhere in these woods, I’ll bet my life.” She laughed, that familiar note of madness turning the sound into something ugly.  “Well, his life. Not that that’s worth much these days.”

Romero grunted.  Something rustled, off to the east, near the road; a deer, Neil guessed, but it was enough.  “There!” Romero’s exclamation was whispered, and two sets of footsteps disappeared. A minute passed, then two, before Neil allowed himself a proper breath.  It pulled on the torn muscles, and the burn made him light-headed for a few seconds. He counted to ten, then forced himself to his feet.

There was a fence nearby, Romero had said.  Neil had no idea what lay on the other side of it, but chances were its name was Safety, at least for now.  Step by careful step he slunk silently through the trees until he reached a gap.

A chain link fence, at least eight feet high, stood in front of him.  He peeled his arm off his wound; the bleeding had stopped, for now, but there was no doubt it would start up again if he climbed.  Ducking back under the cover of the trees, he stripped his hoodie off, then his ruined shirt. He slipped his pocket knife out and sliced the cheap cloth into a long strip, then wrapped it around his body and tied it snugly.  Wiping what blood he could off his hands, he pulled the hoodie back on and hooked his duffel more securely across his back.

The climb was excruciating, the pain almost causing him to let go of the wire.  Still, he forced himself up and over as quickly as he could, the adrenaline of his terror dulling all else.  When he dropped to the ground his vision went black, and he stumbled blindly for a few steps before it cleared.

A vast green space lay in front of him; far in the distance he could see white fencing and long buildings glowing in the yellow light of what seemed to be street lamps.  He glanced over his shoulder; there was no sign of any movement in the woods, and he broke into a loping jog towards the deepest shadows thrown by the nearest building.

He flattened himself against the wall and looked back across the expanse of grass; still no sign of Lola or Romero, or anyone else.  But he was far too visible here. As the pain subsided, he started to take stock of where he was.

A familiar earthy scent hit him, and he crept around the corner of the building in disbelief.  Rows of stalls greeted him, along with the faint rustling sounds of their occupants moving and the slow steady grind of chewing.  

It had been years since he had been around horses; he had spent practically his whole childhood on the back of one, but when his mother had grabbed him and run they had left the horses behind.  When he had asked his mother what was going to happen to his pony, she had beaten him so soundly he had never mentioned JJ again. But he had not forgotten the feeling of soaring through the air over a jump, the rhythm of hoofbeats on grass, the warm smell of leather and sweat, the soft brush of a muzzle against his palm.

His reverie was interrupted by the crunch of a shoe on gravel.  There was a stall door right in front of him; he ducked in and tucked himself in the corner, under the water buckets.  The stall’s occupant snorted at him, ears pricked and stiff-legged, and he prayed that she wouldn’t somehow give him away.  From his hiding spot he could just see through the coarse mesh of the door as someone walked slowly down the row, sweeping with their flashlight.  A security guard, judging by the uniform.

The man disappeared, and Neil breathed a little easier.  The filly whose stall he had appropriated was still staring at him, nostrils flaring; he imagined the scent of blood was putting her off.  “Sorry, honey,” he whispered. “Hope you don’t mind me crashing here for a bit.”

Somewhere in his duffel there was an apple he had tucked away, before They had found him again.  Cautiously unzipping it, wary of the noise, he fished around until he found it. “Mind if we share?” he asked, digging his thumbnail in at the stem to split it.  It was bruised but he didn’t care; he took a bite of his half and held the other half out to the horse.

She eyed him warily but stretched her neck out and sniffed it, then lipped it up.  He grinned at her while she crunched, the stretch of his face unfamiliar after so long.  After several long moments she returned to her hay, and he nestled into his corner, pillowing his head on his duffel.  There were still several hours before dawn; he would rest for a little and then be gone. Maybe he’d get lucky and find some first aid kit to fix himself up, but for now, he let himself close his eyes, the rhythmic song of horses eating as good as a lullaby.

 

*****

The crash of hooves against metal startled him awake, followed by cursing in a round southern accent.  “Jesus, Queenie, what the fuck.”

Neil squinted through the early morning light slanting into the stall.  The filly was staring at the doorway, ears pinned flat to her head. A bucket held by a man’s hand hovered just inside his line of vision, but he couldn’t see the rest of the person.  The snap holding the door closed rattled, and the horse lunged, teeth bared; bucket and hand disappeared. “Fine then. You’ll have to wait for your breakfast.”

The horse retreated into the far corner, attention still trained on the door until the man could be heard walking to the next stall.  Then she swung her head to face Neil and her ears pricked. “Thank you,” he mouthed at her, unwilling to actually put any volume to his words though he doubted the man would hear him over his own cheery greeting to the next horse down the line.  Slowly, he sat up, gritting his teeth against the pain in his abdomen before rubbing the shavings out of his hair and brushing himself off.

He figured he could wait until the groom was at the far end of the row, then sneak out and disappear.  His burner phone was tucked into the duffel; it might be time to call Stuart, though that felt so much like giving up.  But any hope he had had that his father’s people would let him disappear after Nathan’s death had fizzled out yesterday when they crashed into the house he had been squatting in, and he was running out of options.

Standing up was an exercise in self-discipline; slinging the duffel back over his shoulder was worse.  He felt something give underneath the shirt he had wrapped around him and it was all he could do not to cry out.  The groom was still chattering away at the horses on his way down the row, his voice getting quieter but every word still audible.  Just as Neil was about to creep to the door, a deeper, rougher voice echoed down the row.

“Problem with Queenie, Nicky?”

“Nah, just more of the usual.  I thought she was getting better, but she tried to rip my face off when I showed up this morning.  Must be that time of the month or something.”

The deeper-voiced man snorted.  “Well, we can’t expect miracles.  She’s doing better than I expected, all things considered.”  Heavy footsteps approached and Neil scooted backwards as quickly as he could, hissing under his breath as he forced himself back under the water buckets and curled up into a ball.  The filly pinned her ears at the door again but didn’t lunge at the rattle of the clip. “Hey, there, easy,” the man’s voice murmured, settling into a well-practiced tone Neil recognized as universal to people dealing with scared horses.  “I’m just gonna give you your food. Then Andrew’ll take you out for a spin later. Nobody here is going to hurt…”

Neil felt the moment the man’s eyes landed on him.  He looked up to meet deep brown eyes, expression quickly shifting from surprised to shrewd.  “Well well, what do we have here?”

The horse startled when Neil shot to his feet, ready to bolt around the man, except whatever muscle it was that had given a little bit before gave out completely and he collapsed forward, crying out when his hands hit the floor of the stall.  He could feel warm wetness soaking through the cloth of his former t-shirt, and he wrapped his arm around his abdomen and forced himself to his feet.

“Easy,” the man said, in the same tone as he had used on the horse.  Neil actually couldn’t tell which one of them he was talking to; the filly’s eyes were wide and her nostrils flared.  “You’re injured.”

“I’m fine.  I just needed somewhere to crash for a night, I’m out of here.”

The man stepped to the side to allow Neil to pass.  The filly gave a low whicker and Neil hesitated, reaching out with his free hand.  She sniffed it, then ducked her head. He gave the white streak down her face a quick rub, then slipped out the door.

He made it a dozen paces before he stumbled; three or four more before he almost went down.  The men were both watching him, but the ground was rolling under his feet and he couldn’t blink away the spots in front of his eyes.  On the third stumble a broad hand caught his arm and steadied him.

“Don’t be an idiot, kid,” the gruff voice said.  “Let us help you.”

“I’m not a kid,” Neil snapped.  “And I don’t need your help.”

“That pool of blood you’re leaving begs to differ.”

Neil looked down; there wasn’t really a pool of blood, but red was starting to seep through the strips of white cloth wrapped around his middle.  He really should have zipped up his hoodie, but it was too late for that now. The man hovering over him was his father’s age, tall and broad-shouldered, with fading tribal tattoos wrapping around his forearms.  Neil flinched away and the man let go of his arm.

“Look,” the man said.  “The way I see it, you can walk away and I’ll go call the police, or you can let me get you some medical attention.”

“I don’t need medical attention, and I haven’t done anything illegal.”

“Really?  How’d you get in here?”

Neil didn’t reply; there was nothing he could say that wouldn’t worsen this situation.  

“Hey, Wymack,” the other man called from over by the stalls.  “Abby’s truck just pulled in.”

Wymack glanced at him in acknowledgement, then gave Neil a considering look.  “You willing to have our vet look at you? She thinks you’re good to go, we let you go.  Otherwise, we’re taking you to the hospital or calling the police. Your choice.”

Neil hesitated; if the vet was willing, he could get stitched up here and be on his way.  Otherwise, they could go ahead and call the police; he’d be long gone before anyone ever found him.  Or not, given that he almost fell over his own feet when he turned towards the groom in silent acquiescence.

A cheerful woman of indeterminate age was opening up the kit in her truck bed when Wymack approached, Neil a couple of reluctant steps behind him.  “Morning, David,” she smiled up at him. “Whatcha got for me today?”

“New colt Reynolds bought,” he grunted.  “Without talking to me, of course. Damn thing cost a fortune for an untried colt.  Tapit son, but even so. Haven’t done much with him, there’s something not right about his gait.”

She nodded and started pulling out equipment, then caught sight of Neil and gave him a broad smile.  “New exercise rider?”

“Nah, another patient for you.”  He gave a rough chuckle at her expression.  “Found him in Queenie’s stall this morning trying his best to bleed out.”

“And you’re not taking him to the hospital because…”

“No hospitals,” Neil said emphatically.  Everyone looked at him, expressions varying from surprise to sad understanding.  “You can just give me some suture, I can fix it myself.”

“Oh my god,” the groom said.  “You’re insane.” He turned to Wymack.  “He’s insane.”

The vet went to a different compartment without a word, pulling out a few wrapped bundles.  “The horse can wait. You come with me.”

Wymack led the way to what turned out to be a surprisingly clean tack room.  At the door he let Neil and the vet through then put a hand out to block the groom.  “Aren’t there stalls to clean and horses to groom?”

“Seth’ll be here in a minute, he can get started.”

“Nicky, go do your goddamn job.  Besides, I seem to remember you almost passing out when Whisper cut her leg last month.”

“Awww, you’re no fun.”  

Wymack closed the door in his face and turned to Neil.  “Look, I don’t know what’s going on with you and frankly I don’t care.  Obviously this isn’t your first trip around the block. I’ve got shit to do, but if you move one goddamn muscle while Abby is working on you I will make you regret the day you were born.”

Neil almost laughed; if only the man knew.  Instead he kept his face expressionless while he nodded.  The vet laid out her equipment on the desk and gestured to a stool.  “I’m Abby Winfield,” she said, opening up a wrapped bundle, then dropping a sterile packet of gloves on top.  

Neil debated not answering; only Stuart knew his chosen name, after all.  But she was helping him when they all could have called the cops, and he would only make things worse by being difficult.  “Neil.”

She nodded.  “Okay, Neil, please take your sweatshirt off.”

He hesitated; she seemed to read it.  “I can already see that you’ve been injured before.  I can’t fix whatever new injury you have if I can’t see it.”

Glancing down, he realized several of his scars were showing in the gap of his unzipped hoodie.  He really was an idiot. Sighing, he shrugged out of the sweatshirt and started to reach for the knot on the t-shirt strips.  

Before he could get it untied, Dr. Winfield had grabbed a pair of scissors and begun cutting.  He gripped the edges of the stool, lifted his chin, and let her work. She didn’t react to the scars that were revealed criss-crossing his torso; only glanced at him apologetically as she peeled the fabric away from the fresh gash.

“How long ago did this happen?” she asked.

“Umm…”  He glanced at his watch.  “About ten hours ago?”

“It’s a little too old to just close up then.”  She hummed as she probed the wound with gentle gloved fingers.  “The outer layer of muscle was lacerated as well as the skin, and I should repair that.  But it’s a bit more involved than just throwing a couple stitches in here.”

Of course it was.  “Do what you have to do.”

“You’re sure you don’t want to go to a hospital?”

He didn’t answer, and she sighed, then pulled up a measure of local anesthetic.  It stung like a bitch, and he chomped hard on the inside of his cheek to stifle his curses.  But once everything was numb, he felt nothing as she flushed the wound with disinfectant, then trimmed and began to suture.  She was neat and efficient, far quicker than his mother had been, and he watched with some fascination as her deft fingers worked.

When she finished, she wrapped him in gauze and that stretchy bandage stuff they used on horses, and then took a step back, snapping off her gloves.  “You have a current tetanus shot?”

He nodded; it was a lie, and they both knew it.  Her mouth tightened. Before she could light into him, Wymack opened the door and walked in, followed by a young woman about Neil’s height and a man even shorter, broad-shouldered and blond-haired; jockeys, Neil would guess.  There was sharp-eyed concern on the woman’s face as she surveyed Neil, and no reaction at all from the man, though his eyes were no less intense.

“We done here?” Wymack asked.

“Just about,” Dr. Winfield answered.  “You need antibiotics, that was a pretty dirty wound and infection will not help you if you’re trying to lay low.”

“Can you write him a prescription?”  Wymack and the vet exchanged a long look, and she gave a tiny shrug before turning to Neil.

“Will you actually take it?”  Whatever she saw in his face must have reassured her.  “Okay. No allergies or anything?” When he shook his head, she got out her prescription pad and then made a face, tapping her pen against it.  

The male jockey seemed to spot the problem first.  “What’s your dog’s name.”

“I don’t have a dog.”

“You do now.  What’s his name.”

Neil rolled his eyes.  “Fluffy.”

“No.”

“What do you mean, no?”

“No.  Sounds fake.”

“What the fuck?”

“It. Sounds. Fake.”  The man enunciated as if Neil was stupid, which, to be fair, there was no reason for him to believe otherwise.  “If you want to write a prescription for a fake dog, you have to give it a name that sounds real.”

“Fine.”  He racked his brain, but he didn’t really know any dogs.  What made a believable dog name? “How about...Buddy. Buster.  Lassie. Uh…” The blond jockey’s expression was getting progressively more mocking and Neil felt his temper rise.  “Cerberus.”

“Sammy,” the female jockey said, taking pity on him.  

Dr. Winfield nodded and scribbled on her pad.  “I need a last name,” she said, sounding apologetic.

Neil scrambled to remember one of the last names he had used on the run.  “Josten.”

She jotted that down and tore off the sheet.  “I didn’t do this,” she said sternly.

“Of course not.  I stole from your truck and did it myself.”

“Keep it clean and dry,” was the last thing she said before striding out of the room.  Wymack and the female jockey followed; the other jockey remained, crossing arms big enough Neil wondered how he made weight.  Neil ignored him, fishing out a clean shirt and pulling it painfully over his head.

He got off his stool and headed for the door, only to be blocked by the jockey.  “Why are you here?”

Neil glared down at him, happy for the rare opportunity to have a height advantage.  “I was assaulted last night, and just needed to get away.”

“Right.  So you climbed an eight foot fence, and just happened to hide in the stall of a highly valuable racehorse.”

Neil rolled his eyes.  “I had no idea she was valuable.  It was a place to get out of sight and get some rest.”

“Of course.”  He made like he was going to get out of Neil’s way, then extended an arm to block him.  “But why that horse?”

“I just picked a stall,” Neil said, puzzled.  

“Minyard, leave the man alone!”  Wymack appeared in the tack room door behind the jockey.  “No harm done, your precious filly is fine. Seth is here, it’s time to get your ass in the saddle.”

The jockey slowly lowered his arm, then spun on his heel and disappeared.  Neil blinked after him, abruptly dizzy with exhaustion. When he dragged his attention up to Wymack, the man was watching him with too much understanding in his eyes.

“Why don’t you lie low here for a day or two, let yourself heal.  We can set up a cot for you.”

“I’m fine,” Neil said, breath coming short at the mere thought of it.  

Wymack just raised his eyebrows.  “You don’t seem like the type of guy who’s dumb enough to put himself into a vulnerable situation.  You go out there like this, you’re a sitting target.”

The man had a point, but his offer made no sense.  “You have no reason to help me.”

“True, but I’m going to do it anyway.  I’ll set up a cot in an empty stall. There’s coffee over there, but if I were you I’d go get a sandwich and then get some sleep, worry about the coffee later.  Nobody will bother you, I’ll make sure of it.”

That last sentence was enough to sway him.  “I can pay you.”

“Do I look like I want your money?”  He pointed out the door and down the row of stalls.  “Go get yourself something to eat. Races start at noon, that’s when it’ll get noisy.”

It was just after seven by the time he bought two egg sandwiches and a large bottle of water.  He found a little grassy hill that overlooked the track, and sat down to watch the barely-organized chaos that was the training of young racehorses while he ate.  

This routine was familiar to him, though he would never say as much to Wymack or his crew.  Though most of his experience was with his pony and his mother’s hunters, his father had had a small string of stakes horses that he used as part of his front.  He had only been to the track a handful of times before, but it always seemed to be the same.

He was too far away to easily pick out people, but a familiar-looking filly was having a temper tantrum on the track.  Her rider just sat quiet on her back while she reared and twisted, scattering the other horses. She finally started trotting in long sweeping strides, and after half a lap went up into a gallop.  Her first dozen strides were more sideways than forward; they were close enough now that he was certain it was his friend, and he could see the moment when her attention fixed on a horse far in front of her.  All of a sudden she shifted into gear, and it was like a bullet had been fired. Her rider was standing in the stirrups, easing her back, but she pinned her ears and drove forward until she blew past the other horse.  Only then did she allow her rider to slow her up to a more reasonable pace for another half-lap before trotting back to where a cluster of people were waiting.

He had hunted in the Maryland fields as soon as he was old enough to cling to a pony’s back; his mother had taught him everything she could about horses of all kinds.  Even on the run he had read about them in library books and online. But he had never seen anything quite like the speed that filly had poured on for that little stretch.  

Something was stirring, deep in his chest.  Something he had thought was dead, but maybe had just been sleeping.  It was too dangerous to stay here; the riptide of ten years of want was already threatening to drag him under.  He forced himself to his feet and headed down the lane that ran along the rows of stalls.

A voice calling his name made him pause; he felt like he was teetering at the edge of a cliff.  He knew the poisonous forest, full of thorns, that waited on dry land. What he didn’t know was if the water below was deep enough to swim in.  Neil took one breath, then another. A horse whinnied; a second one answered in a siren’s song. Closing his eyes, Neil whispered a desperate apology to the sky and took the leap.  

He turned towards the stables, where Nicky the groom was smiling at him.  “Here, we gave you my old cot,” Nicky announced when Neil approached. “These couple stalls are empty, so you can stay here as long as you need.”

“Where will you sleep?”

“Oh, my cousins and I have rooms just outside the track.  Some of the tracks I stay with the horses, but the security here is pretty good.”  He laughed. “Well, maybe not good enough. But they call if they notice anything wrong with the horses, and it’s nice to get a real bed for a couple months.”

Neil still wasn’t sure this was anything remotely resembling a good idea, but he was probably as safe here as he would be anywhere.  With all the foot traffic, someone could come in here after him, but one shout would bring plenty of people running. “Thanks,” he murmured, and Nicky beamed.  

“I’ll just be down here if you need anything.”

Neil nodded, and let Nicky close the stall door behind him.  The small space was reasonably clean, and the cot beckoned to him.  He’d stay the day; maybe two, until the burning in his abdomen started to fade.  Then he’d be gone.

 


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Andrew is suspicious, and Neil can't bring himself to leave.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There are some mild references to extremely unsafe dieting practices in this chapter. This is an unfortunate reality for many (most?) jockeys, with the strict weight restrictions for the job. Be careful if this may be a trigger for you, and feel free to message me [on Tumblr](https://fuzzballsheltiepants.tumblr.com) if you have any questions or concerns.
> 
> As a little reminder for terminology:  
> Claiming race - A race in which there is a set price for the horses running in it, and people can put a “claim” in where they agree to buy the horse at the end.  
> Stakes race - The upper tier of horse races with the highest purses and the best horses. Can be Graded 1, 2, or 3, or ungraded.  
> Blinkers - a hood that horses wear with cups that block some of their peripheral vision. Helps some horses run faster.  
> Lasix - a medication, legal in some states, given to racehorses to enhance performance. It is a diuretic, and may reduce the tendency of certain horses to have bleeding in their lungs when they run at maximal speed.

This was going to be a problem.

No, not going to be; it was already a problem.

Andrew could see all the symptoms of deception, spread out across the table like cards.  Nicky was enamored; Wymack was empathetic; Abby was concerned. Even Dan seemed intrigued.  And none of them, not a damn one, thought it was fishy that “Neil Josten,” or whatever the fuck his real name was, could walk into the stall of the most aggressive horse in the string and have her act like a lamb. Or like she’d known him all her life, which seemed more likely given the circumstances.

Renee would tell him to reserve judgment; Aaron wouldn’t give a shit.  Maybe Kevin would listen. He knew his horse. Not as well as Andrew did, after the past two months of riding the demon spawn, but he knew enough.  She bit and kicked anyone she didn’t know and two thirds of the people she did. After what the goddamn Moriyamas had done to her he couldn’t blame her.

But he couldn’t help wondering why she would take a sudden liking to some kid who just happened to have wandered in off the street, just happened to be pretty enough to draw sympathy, and just happened to be injured not quite seriously enough to require major surgery?

It was too fishy by far.  Made more so when he spotted the kid watching him breeze Queenie with That Look on his face.  That Look that only belonged to the true horse fanatic. That look that had no business being worn by some street rat who just _happened_ to stumble onto the famous Kevin Day’s equally famous filly.

It wasn’t like Andrew didn’t know how this worked.  Everyone did; that was part of the problem. Present Wymack with a good sob story and he was genetically incapable of not capitulating.  Throw in a little reluctance, a cringe here, a flinch there, and you were in like flint.

After all, Andrew had experienced this first-hand, hadn’t he?  Wymack showed up at his parole hearing with an offer too good to refuse.  Not that that had stopped Andrew from laughing in his face as he walked away, but damn if the man wasn’t stubborn.

Dan and Seth had literally been pulled off the street by him.  Andrew, Aaron, and Nicky hadn’t been much better off, what with Nicky’s homophobic parents kicking him to the curb at seventeen.  He had ended up trying to care for his poor pathetic orphaned cousins...though Andrew and Aaron were little more than strangers who happened to share a face.  And now here they all were, well over half a decade later. Dan had found her niche as assistant trainer; Aaron and Seth were clean; Nicky was head groom; and Andrew actually had something interesting to do some of the time.  Wymack would give anyone a chance, as long as they were good to the horses. The sadder the sob story, the better.

And the Moriyamas knew it.

Andrew had horses to ride that afternoon, two for Wymack and a couple for Rhemann, but he found himself watching “Neil” as he emerged cautiously, tousled and wearing that same damn bloodstained hoodie, from the empty stall.  The kid wandered down the row, quietly greeting the curious horses who stuck their heads out to say hello.

No, this kid was no greenie.  And the horses seemed to like him, which should have been encouraging but instead caused that unsettled feeling in Andrew’s stomach to intensify.  About halfway down the row, Neil realized he was being watched and his head whipped around, every muscle suddenly taut. A feral animal, ready to spring or to bolt.  When he spotted Andrew, his posture relaxed; everything but his eyes.

“Hey,” Neil called out, waving the little paper Abby had given him.  “Do you know where there’s a pharmacy I can get this filled at?” He sounded friendly, but Andrew was no fool.  That look in his eyes was too familiar from the mirror.

A retort danced on Andrew’s tongue, sharp and too revealing.  He was saved from having to speak it by the arrival of Wymack and Seth, leading Percy with Aaron on board.  Aaron dropped off Percy while the colt was still walking and tugged his helmet off, studiously ignoring Neil and the calculating way he glanced between them.

“What the fuck, Andrew?” Aaron asked.  “Aren’t you riding in the first?”

Andrew didn’t bother to answer, just turned away from Wymack giving Neil directions to the Walmart and headed towards the locker room.  He changed into his racing silks, maroon and gold for Rhemann’s stable, grabbed his saddle and weight pads, and stepped on the scale. One eighteen.  He silently thanked the laxatives he’d taken and headed towards the tack up stall.

Kona was an exercise in frustration, a horse with potential stakes-worthy speed who only ran when he felt like it.  Which explained both why a horse with his pedigree was in a claimer and why Andrew was riding him. Andrew had worked him a few times but this was his first time riding him in a race, getting the shot because Knox had taken a spill and cracked his collarbone.  Rhemann had spent the past few months trying to figure out how to get him to run. Blinkers caused a tantrum. Nasal strips made no difference, nor did Lasix. Sometimes he’d refuse to run in the rain, sometimes on a dry track. Once with Knox in the stirrups he had led wire to wire, and Rhemann had been ecstatic; the next race he’d loped along and been happy to come in dead last.  The only thing they’d confirmed was that he absolutely hated whips and he preferred the outside post.

Andrew found himself only half paying attention as Rhemann gave him his orders.  Most of his mind was still occupied by a certain vagrant who could at that very moment be doing something to Kevin Day’s filly.  He was boosted into the saddle and got himself organized as he followed the lead pony onto the track. Kona felt different underneath him than he had during the workouts; more coiled, more on-edge.  Out on the track they picked up a trot, and he let the image of a sharp-faced runaway fade to focus on his job.

It wasn’t an easy one.  For all Kona preferred the outside, they had drawn the middle, and the horse went up in the air in the starting gate while the last couple loaded.  His feet had barely touched down when the bell rang and the gate snapped open. He was a split second late as a result, and getting pelted by dirt right off the bat.

Kona’s last half dozen races flashed through Andrew’s mind in the first ten strides.  Cursing under his breath, he tugged his right rein and steered him wide.

They had the better part of a mile left to catch the leaders, and none of the others had Kona’s speed.  As soon as they were wide of the pack, Andrew “sat chilly,” allowing the horse to pick his stride. Running along the outside they’d be forced to cover more ground, but Kona didn’t seem to care, now that he was free from the flying dirt.

One by one, they picked off horses, Andrew registering their silk colors and then dismissing them.  With just over two furlongs left they reached the front of the main pack; there were the two leaders dueling it out several lengths in front still to go.  Andrew tucked himself tight into Kona’s neck and began urging him on with his hands, his voice.

Kona’s ears flicked back, and he dug in.

They were fast running out of track, but they were gaining, stride by stride.  Kona’s nose reached the rump of the horse in second, then the flank. The other jockey was swinging his whip, but Andrew kept his horse wide as they passed.  

One to go.

Dappled haunches were pistoning in front of them, almost as wide as he was.  As they got closer, the horse in front swerved, not enough to foul but just enough to send dirt flying into Kona’s face.  Andrew felt him hesitate for a fraction of a blink before driving forward.

That fraction cost them.  They passed under the wire half a neck behind the gray in Nevermore Racing Stables’ trademark black and red silks; two strides later they had caught him.  Andrew stood in his stirrups to begin collecting Kona back. The horse settled willingly, easing into a canter, then a trot, before turning towards the stables.

Kona’s groom came up and grabbed him, calling, “Good race!” to Andrew.  He jumped off and unbuckled his saddle, grabbing it and the weight pad and heading to the scales.  Rhemann had the good sense to wait until he was done before approaching.

“Well, that wasn’t the race I told you to run, but you did a damn fine job.  Another half a furlong and you’d have had it.”

“He hates dirt in his face,” Andrew said.  

Rhemann looked nonplussed.  “He’s never cared before.”

God, Andrew hated people who refused to see what was right in front of them.  “Watch the tape.”

With that, Andrew headed towards the locker room, not listening for Rhemann’s response.  He needed to change into Wymack’s silks and drink a couple ounces of water before getting on Whisper.  Aaron there waiting for him with a bottle of Gatorade; he was riding a nice filly for Pruitt who had just broken her maiden a few weeks ago.  Andrew was a bit of an outlier among jockeys. He only rode for Wymack and a couple of other trainers, the ones who understood that he never went to his whip hand and used him accordingly.  Aaron didn’t care. He wouldn’t abuse the horses, but otherwise he’d ride for anyone who would hand him the reins.

They walked out together.  Rhemann was still in the paddock, talking to an unfamiliar man.  Looked like Kona had been claimed, then. Andrew didn’t watch as he was led away.  He never did.

The afternoon passed in fits and starts as it always did, the minutes on the track ticking by second by deliberate second, the time in between flashing past in a flurry of people and noise.  He was in the money in three of his four races, winning the last race on the card with Allison’s three year old colt. Piggy was coming along quite nicely, ready to step it up to the stakes, even if he did have a dumbass name.   

For once he was grateful Seth was in charge of Piggy, as the walk back to the stables was quiet.  Fatigue washed over him; he just wanted to get back to the crappy-ass apartment he shared with Nicky and Aaron, eat, and crash.

But around the corner, rubbing Whisper’s forehead while Nicky wrapped her legs, was Problem #1.  Andrew stopped in front of him while Seth brought Piggy over to the wash area.

“I thought you were leaving.”

Neil flushed; Andrew wondered how successful he was at lying when his complexion gave him away so easily.  Unless that was part of the ruse. Embarrassment and lying could look an awful lot alike. The intruder ducked his head, evidently feigning the latter, and excused himself.

“Oh come on, Andrew,” Nicky whined, standing up to crack his back.  “Give the guy a break. Wymack said he can stay as long as he wants to, anyway.”  He moved on to the next leg “Just because you’re not interested doesn’t mean you have to ruin the fun for the rest of us.  By which I mean me, since I’m stuck here with all you straights.”

Andrew stared at Nicky a second too long; thankfully his cousin was bent to his task.  It wasn’t that Andrew was hiding the fact that he was gay, it was just that nobody knew.  Well, except for his occasional hookups, who had their own reasons not to spill, and Renee.  He still didn’t quite understand how Nicky hadn’t noticed. It had become a bit of a game at this point: how many times could he disappear with a guy right under Nicky’s nose before he caught on.

Quite a few, it turned out.  Andrew speculated for a moment if Nicky would notice if he slept with Neil, but that would never happen.  There were far too many reasons to not go down that road, starting with the whole “blatant liar” thing, and it wasn’t like a pretty face and lean body wasn’t available elsewhere.  

After changing out into street clothes, Andrew found Wymack sitting alone in the tack room, shuffling through papers.  Wymack grunted in acknowledgement of his presence though he didn’t lift his head. “Allison is ecstatic, by the way. She wants us to see if we can get him into the Holy Bull.”

Figured.  Colt runs one good race and suddenly he’s a contender.  Like all owners, Allison was pushy; every owner figured their horse would somehow miraculously be The One.  At least Allison listened if Wymack said no. But that wasn’t why he was here.

“He can’t stay.”

Wymack didn’t look up from his entry forms.  “I don’t know, he still looked like he had more in the tank.”

“Not the colt.  The runaway.”

That earned him the patented Wymack dropped-pen, crossed-arms glare.  “The kid needs a place to stay for a few days. You of all people should understand that.”

“I of all people know that it’s never a few days with you.”

Wymack’s glare intensified.  “I know it’s fishy, but the kid’s a sitting duck if he goes out there now.  Somebody obviously has it in for him, you want his death on your conscience?”

“Oh, you know I don’t have one of those.”  He almost could have smiled at the audible grind of Wymack’s teeth; really, the man should’ve known better after all these years.

“Just leave him alone.”

“Next you’re going to tell me he’s harmless,” Andrew snarled with more venom than he intended.

That pulled Wymack up short.  “No,” he said, drawing the two letters out into multiple syllables.  “I don’t think he’s harmless. But I don’t think he’ll hurt us or the horses.”

“And that’s a risk you’re willing to take?  Without even a vote.” Andrew tsked. “I thought you liked to pretend this was a democracy, _Coach_.”

Wymack’s frown deepened at Andrew’s use of Dan’s nickname for him.  He held Andrew’s stare for a long moment. “Fine. I’ll put it to a vote.  But if the vote is for Neil to stay, I don’t want to hear another word about it, and I don’t want to catch you harassing him.”

Andrew held up his hands in mock innocence.  “Fine, okay.” He knew Nicky and Dan would vote for the little liar to stay, and Aaron would side with him.  Seth was a toss-up based on whether he was more hell-bent on pissing off Nicky or Andrew, but he could count on Renee to see reason.

Except Renee simply played with her cross when Wymack pulled everyone together and explained the situation, a troubled look on her face.  And when Wymack asked for the vote, she only gave an apologetic smile to Andrew before voting in favor for the runaway to stay.

Andrew left without a word to any of them.  Renee looked like she wanted to stop him, but he just pushed past her.  He should have known he couldn’t rely on a good Christian girl when he needed logic to prevail over emotion.  So the liar would stay, and Andrew would watch, and eventually Neil would either leave or slip up. Andrew would be waiting.

*****

Neil blinked, and a week had passed.  He still wasn’t totally sure how. It just seemed natural to fall into the routine: the pre-dawn feeding, watching Dan and sometimes Andrew and Renee exercising the horses who weren’t racing, listening to the railbirds talk shit about the horses, the jockeys, the trainers, the owners.  Especially the owners.

Then the afternoons of race after race, the horses coming back sweaty, some dancing on everready hooves, some calm and looking for a hay net and a nap.  After the first couple of days he mostly stayed behind with Nicky and Seth once the races began, preferring the time spent around the horses to the bustle of the crowds.  And on the third day, instead of sitting on a trunk and listening to Nicky ramble, he had picked up a brush and gotten to work. The wound in his abdomen had burned with the movement, but it was worth it to feel Whisper’s coat turn to silk under his hands, to find the places where she leaned into the brush, eyes half-closed with pleasure.

He couldn’t hide that he knew what he was doing, but Nicky accepted the explanation of a childhood pony and moved on without more questions, grateful for the help.  Every night he planned to leave by morning; yet somehow come dawn, with the first rays of the sun stealing across the grounds, the whinnying of hungry horses and the steady rhythm of hooves hitting dirt, he couldn’t bring his feet to wander farther than the track.  Most of the time, he didn’t make it past Queenie’s stall.

All the horses had their individual personalities.  Some were as quiet as the school horses he’d first learned to ride on.  Most of them were like curious puppies, heads constantly popping up over the stall door to see what was going on, hay dangling from their lips only to be sucked in like spaghetti as they watched their buddies walking past.  It didn’t take long to learn who would want a neck scratch and who would rather be left alone.

But it was Queenie who had stolen his heart.  He was the only one who wasn’t greeted with pinned ears and bared teeth, and he’d be lying if he tried to claim that wasn’t part of the pull he felt.  Every night when it got quiet, he would let himself into her stall, share an apple or a clementine with her, and just sit until he was sleepy enough to go to bed.  After a week or so, he found some books in the tack room and began bringing them to read to her. Whether she was actually interested in the story of Seabiscuit or gate training techniques or bloodlines he wasn’t sure, but she would nibble her hay and watch him as he read.  It was the only time he really saw her relax, and it did something funny to his chest when her lip would start to droop and her ears flopped to the side.

Wymack didn’t say much, just nodded to Neil each morning when he arrived with his coffee in one hand and a bagel sandwich in the other.  Every time, guilt roiled in Neil’s gut. He had been there too long already; he could never repay the trainer for what was owed. But Wymack never even hinted at an unpaid debt.  Nobody did, they just accepted him as one of their own, handed him the quieter horses to hold or asked him to pass a bridle or leg wraps.

Nobody, except Andrew.

Not that the jockey ever actually said anything.  No, he acted as if Neil didn’t even exist most of the time.  But Neil could feel hard eyes boring into him every time he reached out to scratch a horse’s neck or grabbed the hose to fill a water bucket.  It made his skin crawl. It made him more determined to stay as long as he could. At least it was easy enough to tell the twins apart; Aaron couldn’t have cared less about his existence, though Neil still did his best to avoid them both.

After two weeks Dr. Winfield pulled him aside as soon as she hopped out of her truck.  It took her barely a minute to snip out the neat row of sutures; she spent a little longer probing with careful fingers before she declared him healed enough to return to basic activities.  “Don’t go lifting anything over about twenty pounds for another two weeks,” she ordered.

Neil nodded; it felt like less of a lie than verbal acquiescence would.  

That morning all the horses seemed higher than normal; even Whisper danced to the track, and Queenie basically became a large horse-shaped kite, her feet spending more time in the air than on the ground.  They didn’t even try to make her stop for Andrew to get on. Wymack boosted him into the saddle in one of the split seconds she was quiet and then she was up in the air, front hooves striking at the sky. Andrew clung on like a burr, waiting for her to come down and then pointing her to the track.

 

 

Neil settled into his spot on the rail, electricity buzzing to his fingertips.  There was still something about this horse he couldn’t look away from. And watching Andrew coax her into the trot he wanted was like watching a master class.  

“He’s good, isn’t he,” Nicky commented from Neil’s shoulder, almost making him jump.

Neil made a noncommittal noise as Andrew eased the filly up into a slow gallop.  Contrary to her antics on the way over, she seemed more interested in running than fighting.  It was so different from the first time he’d seen them, and Neil wondered when that change had occurred.  He expected her to do her mile-and-a-half slow gallop and then get pulled up, but at the mile mark Andrew dropped onto her neck and it was like she had been shot out of a cannon.  Stopwatches clicked up and down the rail. Queenie poured on the speed, blitzing past the other horses, her ears pinned and nostrils flaring wide. At the five-eights pole Andrew stood up in his stirrups and began coaxing her back down to a gallop; she shook her head and fought him for a few strides before steadying.  Another couple eights of a mile had her back to a trot and heading towards the paddock.

“Jesus Christ,” one of the railbirds said, staring at his stopwatch.

“Yeah.  Just think of how good she’d look if Day hadn’t pulled her out of Nevermore.”

The first one snorted.  “Nobody said he inherited his mother’s brains, just her horses.”

Nicky made a strangled sound; when Neil turned to him, he was already three steps away, hands clenched into white-knuckled fists.  Neil hesitated, torn between listening to the assholes or following after Nicky, and in the end chose the latter.

“Those bastards,” Nicky hissed when Neil caught up to him.  “Those fucking know-nothing bastards.” He laughed; Neil was kind of amazed Nicky could make a sound that bitter.  “That filly was a wreck when she came to us, she was a hundred pounds underweight, covered in sores. She wouldn’t even run in a straight line because of those pieces of shit.”

Neil didn’t know much about racing and racehorse trainers, but even he had heard of Nevermore Racing.  Tetsuji Moriyama had one of the largest strings of racehorses in the eastern U.S., and his nephew was extending their reach even further.  They had trained two of the previous five winners of the Breeder’s Cup Classic, and were always in the running for the Triple Crown races. They were a dynasty, having been one of the biggest names in the industry for over thirty years.

And when his father had bought a small string of racehorses before Neil was even born, he had sent them to Tetsuji to train.

He couldn’t stop his hand from running over the worst of the scars on his abdomen, the ridges distinct through the thin fabric of his shirt.  At that moment, Queenie came into the paddock, Wymack at her head and talking quietly to Andrew, the horse for once looking settled in her own skin.  The softness in her eyes was so foreign it struck Neil like a blow.

How fucked up was he that he was jealous of a horse?

He glanced at Nicky in time to watch the cheerful mask drop onto his features.  “Hey, there, girlfriend,” Nicky sang out, and the filly gave him a half-hearted ear pin as he reached for her bridle with the lead shank.  “Who’s a superstar?”

Wymack snorted.  “We need her to do that in an actual race before you can call her that.”

“Don’t listen to him,” Nicky said conspiratorially to the horse.  “You’re a superstar no matter what.”

Neil felt his lips twitch when Queenie swung her head and almost knocked Nicky off his feet trying to rub her sweaty face on his shirt.  At least she didn’t bite him. But then he made the mistake of glancing at Andrew, and almost stumbled back under that heavy stare.

It was better to pretend Andrew wasn’t there, even if he was awed by his skill with the horses.  When they reached the stables Andrew disappeared, and Neil helped Nicky get Queenie cooled off. While Nicky prepped the brand-new colt that was working next he had Neil get their steadiest pony horse ready.  For some reason Nicky always referred to the big paint gelding as Teddy-the-Bear, though almost everyone else just called him Ted. Once Neil had him saddled and ready, Nicky turned to him and grinned.

“Here, I’ll give you a leg up.”

Neil’s heart stopped in his chest.  “What?”

Ted was standing patiently, ears flopped to the side, and Neil put a shaking hand on his neck.  It had been a decade since he’d sat in a saddle, but his mother’s voice was as loud in his ears as if she was standing right next to him.   _You will never ride again_.  His breath came short; she was gone.  She was gone, and somehow he was still alive, and the horses—they were right here.

Nicky noticed his reaction, though he couldn’t understand the cause.  “Don’t worry about it, Teddy-the-Bear’s safe as safe, and Dan’ll do the actual ponying.  You can just ride him over.”

Neil didn’t trust his voice, but he took the helmet Nicky handed him and slipped it on.  Nicky legged him into the saddle like he weighed nothing, and set to adjusting the stirrups.  Ted had to notice Neil’s tremors, but he did nothing other than shift his weight a little. Neil forced himself to take a deep breath and let it out slowly.

It wasn’t real; it couldn’t be.  But he reached forward and rubbed Teddy’s neck, rolling the coarse mane between his fingers, and damn it felt real.  When Nicky grabbed the colt and gestured at Neil, he sat up and gave Ted a little nudge with his calves. It took him a minute to relax into the rocking walk beneath him but his body knew this, as sure as it knew his own two feet.  He couldn’t even focus on what Nicky was babbling about next to him. There was just him and Ted, everything else in the world was gone gray.

Too soon they were at the track, Dan dismounting from one of the two year olds and grinning up at Neil.  “Look at you! Next thing you’ll be working colts for us.”

She didn’t mean it; it was just a throwaway comment, but he couldn’t help but look up at the track, the horses trotting and galloping past.  Forcing a smile, he swung his leg over Ted’s back and let himself drop to the ground. Dan accepted a leg up from Nicky and took the colt’s lead in her right hand.  Neil watched the three of them head out onto the track, the baby gawking at all the chaos, Dan and Ted calm as could be.

Impossible.  This was all impossible.  He needed to leave, now. He couldn’t have this; couldn’t even let himself want this.

Yet his feet stayed fixed to the dirt, his eyes on the glorious horses sweeping past him, and the forbidden want threatened to drag him under.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you enjoyed this one! Thank you so much for all the lovely comments, they mean the world!


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kevin comes to watch Queenie run in her first race for Foxhole Racing. He ends up making Neil an offer Neil can't make himself refuse.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> No particular warnings for this chapter. 
> 
> New definitions: 
> 
> Posting - rising and falling in the rhythm of the trot, a two-beat gait that's faster than a walk and slower than a canter. It's more comfortable for both horse and rider in most cases.
> 
> Lead change - when horses canter or gallop, they "lead" with one of their front legs in front of the other. But running a full race that way would lame and exhaust them, so they change so the other leg leads several times throughout the race. Timing a lead change can be strategic, especially as some horses run better off one lead than the other.
> 
> Furlong - 1/8 of a mile. A 7 furlong race would be 7/8 of a mile.

It was too tempting to say “I told you so” when weeks passed and the runaway was still there.  The only problem was, nobody cared. Even Aaron just shrugged, as if now that Neil was established here it made the situation less sketchy.  Of course, Aaron was always willing to let familiarity lull him into a sense of security.

The enigma didn’t do anything to quiet suspicion.  He was still too jumpy, constantly scanning his surroundings; still too ready to try to fade in the background, shying away from the owners and other trainers that came around; still too good with the horses, even if he did supposedly have a pony when he was a kid.  Queenie suddenly deciding to remember what her job was might be seen by the others as a point in Neil’s favor; Andrew figured they should’ve just gotten her a pet goat and let the runaway be damned. 

He wasn’t surprised when he caught Neil trotting in circles around the paddock on Ted early one morning; he was a little bit surprised at how rusty he looked.  His hands were soft and his position was passable, but his leg was swinging and he was a little bit red in the face as he worked to keep his posting rhythm. 

“I’m sorry, buddy,” Neil muttered when his leg took a particularly bad swing and bumped Ted in the side as they trotted by.  Ted just flicked a casual ear back at him. Andrew supposed if you’re used to being smashed into by thousand-pound colts one awkward human didn’t matter much.  Piggy shook his head, impatient about the delay, and Andrew forced his attention back to the colt he was supposed to be working.

Wymack had gotten it into his head that Queenie was ready for a race, and the week was spent making sure she wouldn’t kill herself or anybody else loading into the gate.   It was appalling that a three year old who had raced several times last year was this upset by the gate, but chalk it up to Moriyama training methods. Figured that the runaway was the one who coaxed her into the training gate after she had nearly brained Nicky.  Once she was standing in the narrow space, trembling, Neil fished something out of his pocket and offered it to her. She hesitated a second before lipping it up, but then Andrew felt her relax underneath him.

“What the fuck was that?”

“A piece of a tangerine,” Neil answered, glancing up at him sheepishly through lashes that should be illegal.  Andrew shook himself mentally for thinking about that in this particular moment. “They’re safe for horses, we always gave them to ours.”

“Your horses.”  Neil nodded while he rubbed Queenie’s forehead.  “I thought you had some pet pony as a kid.”

“I had a pony, yes.  I never said he was just a pet.”  He led Queenie out the open door of the gate and around the back again.  This time she only balked a couple of times before stepping into the narrow space.  The smile Neil gave her as he fed her another chunk of tangerine was brilliant; Andrew dragged his eyes away.

They kept at it until she was calm, then Andrew took her out for a spin, letting her blow off the tension.  The next day was more of the same, this time with the front doors closed. By day three she was loading as easy as Whisper or Percy, even for Nicky, and Andrew hated Neil a little bit more.

Race day came, and with it, Kevin.  It was almost a relief to see his arrogant self in person instead of dealing with the constant texting.  The night before Andrew had ended up putting the damn phone in airplane mode just to have some peace while he got off; the guy at the club had found the whole thing way too amusing, certain Andrew was cheating on a girlfriend with him.  But he had shut up when Andrew told him to and kept his hands to himself, and that was all that really mattered. 

Andrew had a full race load that day, much to Kevin’s irritation.  He insisted that they meet in the morning, much to Andrew’s. Especially when he saw Kevin downing a twenty ounce coffee and he’d had to weigh his fucking water that morning.  

Queenie was a surprise second in the betting, due to her spectacular training times.  After her meltdown on the track in her last race with the Moriyamas, Andrew was surprised she wasn’t the long shot.  He half-listened to Kevin and Wymack yammering on about expectations for the race and what Andrew should watch out for from the other horses and jockeys going in.  As if he didn’t fucking know already. Usually Wymack was better about letting Andrew ride his race, but evidently having  _ Kevin Day _ on hand made him forget his place.  

“Are you even listening?” Kevin asked impatiently when Andrew ignored his seventeenth missive about watching out for the favorite.  

“No.”  Neil had just ridden up on Ted and was talking to Nicky down the row with animation he had never yet shown.  His leg had improved, Andrew noted; he was starting to sit in the saddle like he had been born up there. Which, for all they knew, maybe he had been.

“Andrew—”  Kevin reached out and grabbed his arm, and Andrew moved, seizing his wrist and wrenching it behind his back.  Kevin hissed through his teeth but didn’t fight back. It wouldn’t have done him any good, anyway. He may be a foot taller and almost double Andrew’s weight, but Kevin didn’t stand a chance in a fight and they both knew it.

“Don’t talk to me like I don’t know what I’m doing.  And don’t ever fucking touch me again.” 

He released Kevin’s arm and turned back to where Nicky and Neil were now staring at him.  Neil had dismounted and looked like he was trying to fade into invisibility behind Nicky. Andrew could practically hear the silent conversation Wymack and Kevin were having at his side, but he didn’t care.  Wymack could yell at him all he wanted later.

It only took a minute for Kevin to clear his throat and change the subject, babbling on to Wymack about this year’s crop of foals.  It included the last batch from the stallion Kayleigh Day had bought from the Moriyamas all those years ago. The Raven King had won the Breeder’s Cup Classic and had been the Horse of the Year twenty years ago as a four year old, and had gone on to be one of the top sires over the past couple of decades.  Colic had claimed him last summer, and Kevin had grieved him almost as much as he had his own mother. It explained Kevin’s strange attachment to Queenie, the last of his foals they had kept past the yearling sales.

But Andrew didn’t give a shit about Kevin’s emotional issues, not when they might interfere.  After all, that same sentimental tendency had led him to put the filly with the Moriyamas in the first place, and they had nearly ruined her.  Kevin was as cold and ruthless as a blade when it came to judging talent in horses and humans, but he could be willfully blind at times. That was why he had Andrew.

Kevin’s voice faltered when Neil finished untacking Ted and headed for Queenie’s stall.  “Who the hell is that?”

“Runaway horse whisperer,” Andrew answered before Wymack could.  “Came to us carved up like a Christmas ham a month ago and never left.”  He glanced up at Kevin, almost laughing at the mix of horror and confusion on his face.  “Take it he’s not a Moriyama lackey?”

“I’ve never seen him before.”  It wasn’t an answer, but there weren’t many on the Moriyama team Kevin didn’t know.  “What is he doing with Queenie, is he suicidal?”

“Nope.  Your sweet little princess is in love with him.”  

The horse proved Andrew right by sticking her head over the door and nuzzling Neil’s neck.  Kevin’s expression shifted towards calculating. “Tell me you hired him,” he said to Wymack.

“Not yet.”

“Well if you won’t, then I will.”  

Wymack glanced at Andrew as Kevin strode off.  “This should be interesting.”

Indeed.  

*****

The whole morning, Neil had struggled to contain the butterflies that fluttered every time he thought of the sixth race.  Even his daily ride on Teddy had done little to distract him from the mental picture of Queenie in the orange-and-white silks of Foxhole Racing Stables.  Nothing did...until he got off Teddy and looked up to see a stranger being held in some sort of vice grip by a flat-faced Andrew. Wymack was glaring at them both with more weary frustration than anger or concern.

“Who’s that?” Neil asked, sidling closer to Nicky.  

“Hmm?  Oh, that’s Kevin.  Wonder what he did to piss Andrew off this time.”  Nicky laughed, then shook his head when Neil looked at him blankly.  “You have to know about Kevin. Kevin Day?”

“Queenie’s owner?”

Nicky gave his shoulder a shake.  “Is that all you know him as? He’s like, semi-famous.  He’s dating Thea Muldani.” Neil still didn’t know who he was, but everyone knew Thea Muldani, the captain of the U.S. Women’s Soccer team and winner of the last World Cup.  “Oh my god, Neil. Untack your damn horse.”

He did as he was told, stripping Ted’s saddle off and brushing out the faint sweat marks.  It was hard to keep from staring down the row at the trio standing outside the tack room, who were now talking as if nothing had happened.  Thinking back to what Nicky had told him about what Queenie had endured before she had come here, to the faint scars on her hindquarters and her ferocious reaction to most people, Neil felt rage creeping through his veins.

How could Kevin have allowed that to happen?  Maybe he hadn’t abused the horse himself, but the fact that he had let her stay with them for a full year, that he hadn’t seen it for what it was and decided to intervene sooner… Bile surged up his throat.  

As soon as Ted was settled with his hay, Neil went to Queenie’s stall, just to reassure himself she was still okay.  She greeted him with a gentle nuzzle, and he couldn’t help but smile. “Sorry, honey. No fruit until after the race.  Wymack’s orders.” She gave him a little shove with her nose, then turned back to her hay. “But I have a whole apple for you for after you win, I promise.”

Neil saw Kevin coming and shifted to put himself between Queenie and her owner.  Not that the filly couldn’t take care of herself, but she shouldn’t have to. Kevin noticed, stopping just in front of him and staring down with the haughty demeanor that belonged in one of those BBC shows Neil’s mother had sometimes watched.  “What’s your name?” 

“Leave me the hell alone, that’s my name.”  Queenie punctuated his words with a bang on the door, and Neil reached a hand up to calm her.  Kevin drew himself up taller, somehow managing to ooze even more arrogance.

“You do know that’s my horse.”  

Neil glanced over his shoulder at Queenie, who was glaring at Kevin with her ears back and her nostrils flared.  “I don’t think she cares.”

“Maybe not, but you should.”  

And here it was.  Neil had known this would happen; it was all too good to last.  Of course this asshole wouldn’t want Neil touching his precious valuable horse.  He was suddenly acutely aware of his oversized faded clothes, the way the seams of his jeans were wearing out from his daily rides.  He was the shabby misfit in an upper-tier racing stable, surrounded by millions of dollars worth of some of the fastest animals in the world, and he didn’t even have a valid social security number.

He clenched his empty fists; it all slipped away like sand through his fingers.  What had he been thinking, letting himself try to have this? His eyes started to burn, and bitterness flooded his mouth.  “Oh, I do. I care very much about the person who turned this horse over to people who would terrorize her.” Kevin’s green eyes went wide, and he opened his mouth as if to say something, but Neil bulled on.  “I care that you would let her be abused for a full year before you finally decided to take her out of there. I care that you’re more concerned with a trainer’s fame or some purse or whatever, than you are about your own horse.”

They had an audience, he realized abruptly.  It seemed like the whole stable was there, staring at them, and it knocked him off his rhythm long enough for Kevin to say, “I don’t have to explain myself to you.”

“No, you don’t.  You just have to explain it to her, and hope she understands.”  He gestured with his head at the horse behind him, then spun on his heel and stormed away.

He didn’t stop until he was in the bathroom near the jockey’s room.  It was empty as usual, and he leaned against the wall and covered his face with shaking hands.  Over. It was all over, and now having let himself have this again, even if only for a month, he didn’t know if he would survive giving it up.  It had already been hard enough, keeping going on the run now that he was alone. That gaping hole his mother had left in his life suddenly yawned, four times as wide.  Insurmountable.

The door to the bathroom crashed open, and he started back, but it was only Andrew.  He spotted Neil and started clapping, slow and vicious. “That was quite the performance.”

“It wasn’t an act,” Neil snapped.  He rubbed his hands over his face again, willing himself to just shut up.

“No?”  There was an amused hint to Andrew’s voice, but Neil wasn’t fooled.  He let his hands fall to his sides, his head dropping back until it hit the wall.  Andrew was watching him, unreadable as always, but there was something different in the intensity of his stare  “Well, act or not, get your shit together. The great Kevin Day wants you to be the one to get Queenie ready, and I don’t have time to babysit.”

With that, Andrew disappeared.  Neil checked his watch; half an hour before the first race, a sprint for two-year-olds. Andrew was cutting it close.  Neil’s duffel was stowed in one of the groom’s lockers. He just had to walk through the clubhouse, grab it, and he could disappear into the crowd.  He wouldn’t stay to watch Queenie run; it would be too hard to leave if he did. Nobody would care if he left; if anything, they’d probably be relieved, even if he’d been doing his best to pull his weight the past couple weeks.  It wouldn’t matter. He didn’t matter.

_ Except to Queenie. _  The thought came unbidden, and it froze him before he could push off the wall.  He wasn’t blind. He knew the filly preferred him to any of the others, and it wasn’t just because he was her own personal fruit dispenser.  Little images of her played behind his eyes like a movie: every expression, every movement, every touch of her silky muzzle on his palm.

Fuck.

An hour later, he was back in front of Queenie’s stall.  Kevin was sitting on her grooming trunk, shuffling through some papers while he waited.  The cockiness in that grated on Neil’s nerves, but he took a deep breath and shoved the irritation deep down where even the horse wouldn’t sense it.  

He could feel Kevin’s eyes on him as he rubbed her forehead in soothing circles.  The silence stretched on, broken only by the sounds of Seth getting Snookie ready down the aisle.  “I was there when she was foaled,” Kevin finally said, quietly enough it felt like part of the natural rhythm of the stable.  “She was perfect. Up on her feet in twenty minutes. She barely even wobbled.”

Kevin sighed and ran a hand through his black hair.  “My mother always sent our horses to Nevermore. The ones we kept, I mean.  Most of them go to the sales, but she had always kept one or two each year.

“I didn’t realize, you know?  After she died, I just kept doing what she did.  Because they’re the best.” He held up a hand when he saw Neil start to speak.  “I know, now. I should’ve known when Andrew refused to ride for them, even after they tried so hard to recruit him.”  He shook his head. “But if you think it didn’t kill me when I went to see her, after they said she’d never make it, that I should just turn her into a broodmare…”  The little sigh he gave was a blade through Neil’s ribs; the next whispered words the twist. “I was there when she was born.”

“What do you want from me?” Neil finally managed to say, relieved his voice was steady.

“Be her groom.”

He offered it casually, as if it was nothing; but something in his face told Neil that Kevin knew what this meant.  Neil could feel the weight of shackles settling around his ankles and his breathing came short. He couldn’t afford to be tied down like this; not when Lola and Romero were still out there.  Tearing his eyes away from Kevin, he caught Queenie watching him, and he stumbled back a step. 

“Don’t run,” Kevin said, holding his hands up.  “Just...be her groom today. That’s all I ask.”

Neil hesitated a moment, then nodded.  The shackles clicked shut.

Nicky helped him, of course.  They got her gleaming, and Neil spent half an hour combing bedding out of her tail.  Then with extreme care he wrapped her hind legs, and right before they were set to go to the track he slipped her fancy racing bridle on, then ran a lead shank through the bit.  Wymack appeared and checked everything over. With a curt nod, he led the way towards the paddocks, Kevin at his side. Nicky gave Neil an encouraging smile, and they followed.

Queenie started to jig and toss her head as they got close to the paddock.  Neil started murmuring to her, whatever nonsense came into his head. It was some story about a mighty pegasus with invisible wings, who could run faster than all the other horses.  He thought it might’ve been something he’d made up as a kid, but he wasn’t sure. Queenie settled as he talked to her, and then they were in the tack-up stall, facing the wall. 

Renee walked by with her saddle on her arm, and gave a small wave with her free hand.  She was riding a filly for someone else, Neil didn’t remember who. He hoped the horse wouldn’t be serious competition for Queenie.

Andrew appeared a few minutes later, saddle and weight pad in his arms, looking completely unruffled by the chaos around him.  Wymack took the pads from him and settled them carefully on Queenie’s back, followed by the saddle. She made a face as he tightened the girth, but Neil stroked her cheek and she huffed a sigh and relaxed a little.  The overgirth followed, all the tack was checked minutely, and then Nicky boosted Andrew into the saddle.

Wymack led Queenie to the track, neither he nor Andrew bothered by her crab-walk across the paddock.  When he handed the horse off to the pony rider, Kevin tapped Neil on the shoulder. “Come on up to the box, you’ll see better.”

Neil almost refused—he wanted to be on the rail, closer to the horses—but Nicky was following Wymack up the steps to the box so he trailed along after them.  Dan handed him a pair of binoculars and he jammed them into his eyes so hard he almost hurt himself. His heart was in his throat as he watched the horses warming up, picking out Queenie’s copper coat and the gleam of the bright orange-and-white silks in the afternoon sunshine.  She kept her head as they trotted and cantered up the track alongside the pony horse, and too soon they were loading into the starting gate.

She had drawn the third post position, and Neil found himself chewing on his nails as he watched her balk as the gate crew member took her bridle.  It looked like Andrew said something to the man, and the guy gave her neck a little rub. She followed him into the gate with only a little bit of head tossing.  Four more loaded after her, including Renee in the sixth post, and then the bell rang and the track exploded with the thundering of hooves and the screaming of fans.

Queenie broke well, but Andrew held her back in the pack, not letting her surge to the front.  She settled into a rhythm, her strides coming easy, and Neil felt himself relax.

“What the fuck is he doing?” Kevin muttered.  “He’s supposed to take her to the front.”

Neil didn’t take his eyes away from the mass of horses, straining to see the Foxhole orange through the rainbow of silks.  “She likes to chase them down,” he said.

“What?” Kevin asked.  “No, she’s a frontrunner.”

Wymack spared Neil from answering.  “In her workouts, she’s been doing better if she comes from behind.”  Neil glanced at him, and caught the quick flash of a grin before he looked back at the horses heading into the turn.  

“She’s going to run out of track,” Kevin muttered when they hit the half-mile pole.  “It’s only a seven furlong race.”

Neil looked at where the frontrunner was, perhaps seven lengths ahead of the dot of orange that was Andrew, still standing in his stirrups in the middle of the pack.  He did some quick math in his head. “Not if he lets her go now.”

As if Andrew had heard him, he dropped into a crouch on her neck, and Queenie shot forward.  They picked off one horse, then two; only two more to go and they’d be in the lead. Andrew steered her towards the rail, shortening the distance she had to travel.  As they approached the straightaway, the horse in front started to fade, overtaken in a flash by the second horse and then Queenie. Neil leaped to his feet as they hit home stretch and Andrew signaled her for a lead change.  The second she swapped she charged ahead, threading inside the other horse, her ears pinned flat. They were twin blurs along the rail, approaching the finish line nose to nose. Three strides out Queenie surged, and they flashed under the wire a half length ahead.

Neil was dimly aware he was screaming; Kevin was screaming next to him, Nicky jumping up and down on his other side.  When he saw Andrew easing up, Neil bolted down the stairs. He needed to get to her, to tell her how brilliant she was and give her her apple.  Hell, he’d go get her more apples. All the apples. He didn’t care, whatever she wanted he’d make it happen.

She was blowing when she jogged off the track, reins scraping the foam off her neck, but she still had a spring in her step.  Neil let her rub her gross sweaty head on his shirt as he grabbed her bridle and strung the lead shank through the bit. “That was fucking amazing, honey!”

Andrew huffed, but there was a hint of a smile on his lips when Neil looked up at him.  “Don’t call me honey.”

Before Neil could respond, another horse jogged by, and Renee’s voice called out, “Congratulations, Andrew!”  Neil started; he had almost forgotten she was in the race, he had been so mesmerized by watching Andrew piloting Queenie.  Wymack took the horse from him, and Kevin lined up in front of her in the winner’s circle, Andrew still perched in the saddle.  They beckoned at Neil, but he took a step back and shook his head. Nicky joined them instead while the photographer took a few shots, then Andrew dropped off Queenie’s back and headed for the scales, saddle and lead pads over his arm.

“Good race, Andrew!” Nicky called after him.  He received a middle finger over Andrew’s shoulder for his troubles, and he sighed. 

“What’s that all about?” Neil asked.

“That’s Andrew for you,” Nicky shrugged.  “Never gives a shit about his results, it’s just on to the next one.  Maybe Kevin’ll convince him to get a drink tonight to celebrate, but that’s it.”

Neil watched Andrew walking away for a moment before turning back to the horse.  He wasn’t sure how he did it; how he could ride so brilliantly and then just...move on.  It was like it didn’t matter to him. But there had been that moment, when Neil had met his eyes, that he had seen that little glimmer.

He wondered if Andrew was lying to himself, or just faking the nonchalance to fool everybody else.

But there was too much to do for him to spend time thinking about it.  Queenie needed to be cooled off, and he took charge of the hose, laughing as she stuck her face in the spray.  Then he took his time walking her around, letting her nibble up a little grass here and there, stopping every lap so she could drink some water.  Kevin was hovering around, watching him; it felt like an audition he had never planned to try out for.

Once she was in her stall with a full hay net and munching on her first apple, he was unsurprised to turn around and find Kevin right behind him.  Wymack wasn’t far, watching the two of them with wary eyes. Nicky pretended to be weighing out grain, but he was keeping an eye on them as well. Neil wanted to run, but he planted his feet and waited.

“How did you know?” Kevin asked.  Neil didn’t know what he meant, and he guessed that showed on his face.  “When Andrew needed to make his move. You called it perfectly. How?”

“I don’t know.”  Neil thought back to the moment, remembering the distance, how fast he had seen Queenie cover it before.  “Lucky guess?”

“Don’t lie to me.”  The order had Neil bristling, and Kevin sighed.  “You ride, Nicky said.” Neil nodded, not sure where this was going.  “You raced before.” 

It wasn’t a question, but Neil shook his head.  “No. Foxhunted. But it’s been years.”

Kevin nodded, looking satisfied, and turned to Wymack.  “Put him in jockey school.”

Dan laughed.  “There’s a three-year waiting list.”

Kevin was undeterred.  “Then apprentice him. Andrew could make him great.”

This time it was Neil who was incredulous.  “I thought you wanted me to be a groom. Besides, Andrew hates me, he’ll never accept that.”

“He will,” Kevin said, with the assurance of a fanatic.  

“Don’t I get a say?”  

“What, are you going to try to tell me you don’t want it?”  Kevin scoffed. “I told you not to lie to me.”

Neil opened his mouth to deny it, but the words wouldn’t come.  He remembered the feel of galloping across the countryside, leaping hedges and walls.  That sense of oneness that he had never had with another person, but was so easy to find with a horse.  Kevin saw the shift in his expression and nodded, satisfied.

“You say yes, and I’ll figure out the rest.”

Neil expected to hear his mother’s voice in his ear, yelling at him; to feel her pulling at his hair, her fists on his body.  But though there were a thousand obstacles in his way, there was nothing there to stop him. “Yes.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I really enjoyed making Thea the more famous one, and as an athlete, in that particular pairing. Also, there is only one jockey school in the U.S. and it only accepts 12 riders a year. Most Americans who become jockeys end up doing it solely as apprentices to trainers.
> 
> Thank you so much for the comments! I hope you continue to enjoy, and I love hearing what you think!


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Neil begins the grueling training required to become a jockey - then faces some of the realities involved in becoming legitimate. Andrew continues to find himself drawn towards the runaway.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning for a panic attack, and for a few further references to the extreme calorie restrictions jockeys face.
> 
> Definitions:  
> Stakes race - The upper tier of horse races with the highest purses and the best horses. Can be Graded 1, 2, or 3, or ungraded.
> 
> Mechanical horse - Exactly what it sounds like. There are computer programs that set the movement of the horse to closely mimic that of a real horse, and it can be a safe and effective way to learn new riding techniques.

“No.”

“Andrew.”  Kevin’s voice was the firm bossy one that probably got him his way with his farm workers and breeding clients, but Andrew knew what it hid.

“Kevin.”  He kept his face as impassive as possible, but there was no way he was giving in on this one.  He was not going to spend more time at the track, working with a lying runaway who happened to be too pretty for his own good.  Andrew didn’t care how talented he was. He was dangerous.

“Renee said she’d help, and Dan will too.  He can exercise some of the horses for you, reduce your workload.”

“Begging is not your strong suit, but by all means feel free to continue.”

It was always entertaining to watch Kevin choking on his indignation.  Unfortunately, Wymack had to ruin his fun. “Well, you’ll have to get used to him being around.  As of about an hour ago, he’s apprenticed to me.”

Great.  There was a strict no-smoking policy, but at least Andrew had cigarettes in the pocket of his street clothes and as of now he was done with this conversation.

Kevin tried to catch his eye, but Andrew ignored him.  There was no way he was bringing Kevin to the club; even if they hadn’t gone the night before, he was in no mood to enable anyone’s alcoholism that night.  

Someone must have warned Neil about his reaction, or else he had predicted it, because the next day he avoided Andrew as studiously as he always had.  Andrew noticed when Renee took him into the clubhouse, but otherwise worked his horses like usual and then went to get ready for his races. Piggy was entered in his first stakes that afternoon, and he wondered if he was going to be unfortunate enough to have to deal with both Kevin _and_ Allison this weekend.  

Renee and Neil were in the jockey’s room, screwing around with the mechanical horse.  Neil had a look of intense concentration on his face as Renee worked with him on adapting to the very short stirrups jockeys rode in.  Andrew distantly remembered learning this, the burn in his thighs and ass from holding himself crouched, his surprise at how much abdominal strength it took.  Neil was able to hold the crouch for about a minute before he collapsed onto the mechanical horse with a weary laugh.

There was an exhilaration in his face that was hard to look away from.  A dim part of Andrew wondered if he had ever felt that, about anything. It set off something in his chest that felt too much like wanting.  He shook his head and turned away.

Allison came, of course.  Piggy was the first horse she had bought as a yearling, and the first one to make the grade to the stakes.  When Andrew had changed out of Mosher’s silks and into the Foxhole’s, he found her in the paddock, enveloped in perfume and a dress that made it look like this was Derby day and not some ordinary stakes race at an ordinary track.  It was a grade three stakes and would be the best competition the colt had faced, and he supposed for Allison it might as well have been the Triple Crown.

He weighed in and watched as the lead was added to the weight pad.  Piggy had been assigned a slightly higher weight than Andrew had expected and he gritted his teeth before forcing himself to relax.  It wasn’t long before he was in the saddle and heading onto the track, Piggy bouncing along next to the lead pony. The colt felt ready.  More than ready; he felt joyful with every stride.

The race went off like a dream.  Piggy listened to every quiet signal Andrew gave him, and they saw the opening in front of them at the same time.  The colt had no interest in dueling with the leader; he blew past him like he was standing still, and hit the wire a length and a half in front.

Afterwards Allison made like she was going to kiss him, laughing at the expression warning her off.  It was Andrew’s fifth trip to the winner’s circle in two days, and the most money he’d ever made in a weekend.  He’d always been better than average with his results; most jockeys ended up in the money only twenty percent of the time, and he was closer to forty.  But for the past month, it was over fifty, and he had more wins than he had ever had before.

“Who’s that cutie?” Allison asked, breaking into his train of thought.  Andrew knew who she was talking about even before he saw where she was looking.  Neil was walking Queenie, wholly absorbed in the horse, the setting sun turning his hair and her coat to matching flames.

Wymack grunted.  “New apprentice.”  He silently dared Andrew to say more, but Andrew kept his mouth shut.  

Allison hummed and looked at Neil appraisingly.  “He any good?”

“Too soon to tell.  The horses like him.”

“He’s a good-luck charm,” Nicky piped in, grinning.  “We’ve been winning more than ever since he showed up.”

Andrew tuned them out as they shifted to discussing Allison’s ever-expanding string of horses.  He only cared about the ones he was riding, and several of hers were still to be started; he’d worry about them when they got to the track, if they ever made it.  He thought about what Nicky had said. Andrew didn’t believe in luck; it was a myth to explain why everything came to some people and nothing to others. A way of soothing the guilt of the rich, and the white, and the straight, right up there with the concept of the American dream.

The weeks went by in the same cycle as always, drawing closer and closer to returning to Palmetto.  He wouldn’t admit it, but he missed their home track, with the house they had bought nearby. It was just a step below Churchill Downs and Santa Anita; the competition was better there, with better horses and better purses.  

As much as he tried to ignore Neil, he couldn’t miss it when Wymack first put him up on Whisper.  The mare was steady as a rock and knew her job, but Neil was barely breathing when he set his feet in the stirrups and pointed her towards the training track.  Renee was at her head, talking to him in a low voice, and Andrew saw the moment he buttoned his nerves away.

Andrew had his own horses to school, but he stopped to watch.  Wymack explained what he wanted: trot a mile, then gallop a slow mile in two minutes thirty seconds.  A light workout for a fit horse, but it would tax a new rider. Dan was up on Percy, waiting for him to join her.  They headed around along the outside rail in an easy trot, Dan’s mouth moving, Neil nodding at whatever she said. After a lap they changed direction and took the inside rail, moving up into a gallop.  The first furlong was too fast, the second too slow; but then Neil found his pace. He stood up in the stirrups, hovering over the horse. His balance was solid, not relying on his hands, and Andrew found himself reluctantly impressed.  

Neil pulled up, panting and smiling, and Andrew turned away to find Renee waiting her turn on Snookie.  “You should give him a chance,” she said, but he pretended he didn’t hear her and headed to the barn to get on Mag.  

But somehow, the runaway kept working his way under Andrew’s skin.  Every morning when he went to work Queenie, Neil was there with his smart mouth and his stupid affection for the filly.  He found himself watching his rides over and over, like some sort of idiotic compulsion. Someone had found him a pair of boots that fit and a pair of breeches that didn’t; Andrew was pretty sure they had been Dan’s at some point.  It pissed him off, seeing them just about falling off those narrow hips, Neil self-consciously hitching them up every few minutes. One of these days it was going to be a wardrobe malfunction at thirty miles an hour and Andrew probably wouldn’t be fortunate enough to witness it.

They moved back to Palmetto, and Andrew felt like he was taking a deep breath after spending too long underwater.  At least he didn’t have to worry about the logistics of transporting almost thirty horses seven hundred miles. Wymack, Dan, Nicky, and Seth dealt with that nightmare.  It gave Andrew and Aaron a rare day to rest, and a chance to visit Eden’s. Whisky and Roland were the two indulgences Andrew let himself have, and he partook in both.

It quieted his mind, as it always did; at least until the next morning, when he got to Queenie’s stall and Neil shot him a cheeky smile.  “See, honey?” he said, stroking the filly’s neck. “I told you he wouldn’t abandon you.”

“I thought I told you not to call me honey.”

Neil laughed.  Andrew reached out and let Queenie sniff him, then rubbed her forehead in the little circles he’d noticed she liked.  He could feel Neil’s eyes on him, and he wondered what the runaway was thinking, if he was still plotting his escape half the time or if he was willing to let Palmetto be his home.  

Wymack’s voice calling down the shedrow made Neil flinch, and Queenie pinned her ears at Andrew as if it was his fault.  “What?” Andrew asked her, and she bobbed her head suspiciously before turning to nudge Neil with her nose. “You better go see what Coach wants.”

Neil slipped out of the stall; Andrew followed him into the tack room to steal some coffee, adding an extra teaspoon of sugar and a generous dollop of milk.  He didn’t have any races for a couple of days, so he could afford it.

Wymack dropped a couple sheets of paper in front of Neil.  “Application for your apprentice license. You’ll need to have it before you can start the schooling races.”

Andrew could hear Neil swallow from across the room.  He stared down at the papers like they were piranhas, slowly reaching out a hand to push aside the top sheet and study the bottom one.  Wymack held out a pen, and it might’ve been a gun judging by the way Neil backed away from it. “I…”

“What—”  But Wymack didn’t get a chance to finish his sentence before Neil bolted.  He looked up at Andrew, who shrugged and ambled towards the door.

He made it outside in time to see Neil disappearing around the far end of the row.  With a sigh, he headed after him. Horse heads popped over stall doors to watch. Queenie craned her neck, trying to see around the corner.

Neil was crouched down next to the trash can at the end, gasping for air, his whole body shaking with the effort.  “Stop it,” Andrew said, but Neil just shook his head and curled in tighter. “Come on. Your damn horse is worried.”

He helped Neil up and half dragged him around the corner and into Queenie’s stall.  The filly sniffed at them both, the air from her huffing blowing Neil’s hair. Andrew left one hand on the back of Neil’s neck and started counting quietly, in the voice he used to settle unruly colts.  “One, two, three. One, two, three.”

Almost unconsciously, Neil’s lungs started trying to match the rhythm of Andrew’s counting,  body hitching under Andrew’s hand as he caught his first real breath. It took several minutes before his trembling stopped and he was able to reach a tentative hand out to Queenie.  She lipped at it; when no treats were forthcoming she inspected him, then returned to her hay.

Neil leaned his head back against the stall wall and looked at Andrew.  He was still guarded, poised to run despite the pallor of his face. Andrew let himself out of the stall.  “Stay,” he said, almost laughing at the irritation that drove away some of the panic in Neil’s eyes.

Wymack was sitting at his desk, filling out entries on his computer.  Andrew scooped up the licensing form and his coffee, polishing off the latter and setting the empty mug on the desk.  A couple of bananas sat browning sadly on top of the mini-fridge; another failing attempt for Wymack to eat healthy, no doubt.  Andrew snagged one of those and headed back to the door.

“What’s going on?  Where’s Neil?”

Andrew waved a hand at him.  “I’ve got it covered. Find someone else to work the horses today.  We’ll be back later.”

“Andrew.”  Andrew paused, reaching up to catch the small object that was flung his way.  A credit card. “Get him some clothes while you’re at it,” Wymack called as the door swung shut.

Neil hadn’t moved from his spot in the stall.  Andrew wondered for a moment if his feet would even hold him if he tried.  He peeled the top of the banana, breaking it in half and holding the part still in the peel out to Neil.  Using his thumb, he split the mushy section he held into smaller pieces, making a face at the feel of it embedding under his nail.  

Queenie gobbled the chunk he held out to her, then the next one.  Neil was watching with a peculiar expression. “Eat that,” Andrew ordered, and Neil complied, finishing his half as Queenie licked Andrew’s palm clean.  “Now come on.”

*****

Every instinct screamed at Neil to run, but he couldn’t summon the energy.  He trailed after Andrew, confused as to why he had helped him and where he was taking him now.  Andrew wanted nothing to do with him; he’d made that clear, over and over. The only time they ever spoke was around Queenie, and Neil had seen Andrew watching him ride only to turn away in disgust.

He could still feel the weight of Andrew’s hand, warm and calloused, grounding him in the here and now.  That and his voice had pulled him out of the waking nightmare that had snared him when he had looked down at that license application and imagined filling it out honestly.  That was all it would take: Nathaniel Wesninski getting a jockey’s license, and Lola and Romero would be there, knives ready.

It might not even be just him they would make bleed.  He still remembered the dead pigs Lola had made him carve up.  The thought of Lola—of anyone—putting a blade to Queenie made him retch.  Andrew glanced back at him, and he shook himself. He couldn’t trust Andrew to be so tolerant of a second panic attack so soon.

He followed Andrew to his car, something sleek and black that looked stupidly expensive.  Andrew didn’t say anything, he just started driving. He drove like he rode, fast and smooth and unafraid.  Neil slowly relaxed into the leather seats despite himself.

Twenty minutes later they pulled into a shopping center.  Neil looked around, wondering what they were doing there, until Andrew pointed to a shop near one end.  It was a tack shop, a high-end one Neil remembered from his childhood. Neil scanned the building, noting the cameras dotted along the roofline.  He crossed the lot with his face down, tucked slightly behind Andrew’s shoulder, not relaxing until they got under the eaves. Andrew shot him a look that might have been curious, might have been annoyed, but Neil just shoved through the doors into the tack shop.

The warm smell of leather greeted him, and he wanted to go and run his fingers along the bridles hanging on the wall near the door.  Andrew grabbed his sleeve and tugged him over to the breeches, flipping through them until he pulled a few options off the rack and shoved them into Neil’s arms.

“Try these on.”

“What?  No. I don’t need these.”

“You’re an embarrassment.  One of these days your breeches are going to fall off in the middle of a ride and your dick is going to be waving around for everyone to see.”

Neil huffed.  “Would that really be such a crime?”  But he took the breeches and ducked into the sole changing room.

They were...tight.  Very, very tight. He fussed around, glancing in the mirror.  Wearing these he might as well be putting his assets on display, but at least everything was pretty much shrink-wrapped into place. 

There was a knock at the door.  “Just a second!” The handle rattled, and Neil reached for it in annoyance and wrenched it open.  “Andrew—”

But his ire was wasted.  Andrew was utterly unfazed as he scanned him up and down, then gave a curt nod and tossed an armful of shirts at him.  Neil used the door to shove him out of the tiny room and sighed as he perused the shirts. There were a variety, short- and long-sleeved, some button-up, some half-zip pullover, all an extremely light-weight high-tech fabric.  All the jockeys wore similar clothes; even a lot of the grooms did. He took a deep breath and let it out slowly, then tugged his shirt over his head.

The shirts fit him like a second skin, and he spent a few minutes making sure his scars didn’t show through the clingy fabric.  But Andrew had chosen colors and patterns dark enough that nothing was visible. Neil wondered if he remembered what he had seen, that morning Abby had stitched him up.  The idea that Andrew would not just remember, but take that into consideration, made something in his chest twist.

When he had changed back into his own clothes, he gathered up the two piles.  Andrew took them from him as soon as he stepped out, carrying them over to checkout.  “I don’t need all of this.”

Andrew ignored him, dropping several sets of tall light socks designed to go under riding boots and two pairs of gloves, white and black, on the pile.  Neil blanched at the number that flashed on the checkout computer screen, but Andrew didn’t blink as he stuck a credit card in the reader.

“Thank you,” he said as they got into the car, the bags stowed in the trunk.

“Thank Coach, it’s his money.”

But that wasn’t what Neil meant.  He kept quiet, until it became clear they weren’t heading back to the track.  “Uh, where are we going?”

Andrew pulled into a twenty four hour diner in answer.  Neil raised an eyebrow at him; he’d been rather surprised by how strict a jockey’s diet was, and he was pretty certain there was no room for eating out.  Apparently Andrew didn’t care, though. He parked and headed through the glass doors.

Inside, he ordered coffee and eggs; Neil followed suit, his breakfast long-forgotten.  Once the waitress had walked away, Andrew reached into his jacket and pulled out papers that Neil recognized instantly.

His legs started trembling, begging him to run, and he forced them into stillness through an effort of will he didn’t know he possessed.  The waitress appeared with coffee, and the pair of them stayed quiet while she poured and Andrew dumped sugar into his, stirring it slowly before he spoke.  “What’s the issue?”

Neil had no clue how to answer.  The truth was out of the question, but he couldn’t think of a convincing lie.  “I can’t.”

“Do you not know how to read?”  Andrew said it flatly, no judgment or curiosity.  Just a simple question, looking for a solution. It shouldn’t have been comforting, but it was.

“I can read,” Neil said, feeling a smile pull at his lips.  “In more than one language, in fact.”

“Then what’s the issue?” Andrew repeated.

“I can’t tell you.  Not here.” Not anywhere, but if he bought himself enough time he’d come up with something.

Andrew accepted that and sipped at his coffee.  Neil studied him, wondering what was going on in his head.  He was one of the best jockeys in the east; could be one of the best anywhere, except he limited who he would ride for.  “What’s Queenie like?” Neil blurted out. “To ride, I mean.”

“She’s a horse.”

Neil rolled his eyes.  “Yeah, but is she fun?”

“Fun.”  It was amazing how much scorn Andrew could pack into three letters.  “It’s not a pony ride.”

Neil stared at him, lost.  He recalled his conversation with Nicky, about Andrew not caring about winning.  He hadn’t believed him; even less when he’d seen how soft he was with Queenie earlier, his gentle pets, and the banana, but now doubt crept into his mind.  “Don’t you like riding?”

Andrew shrugged.  “Beats prison.”

Neil almost laughed but something told him Andrew wasn’t kidding.  They finished their food in silence. Andrew threw some cash on the table and scooped up the papers.  Back out in the car, Neil found his voice again. “Why were you in prison?”

Andrew was still except for a muscle moving in his jaw, then he twisted in his seat.  “Here’s how this is going to work.” He dropped the papers in Neil’s lap. “You can ask me a question, and I’ll answer honestly.  Then you are going to tell me why you can’t sign the papers. The truth, not whatever lie you’ve concocted over the past twenty minutes.  Yes?”

Neil’s eggs threatened to make a reappearance.  “There are some things I can’t tell you.”’

“Okay.”  Andrew straightened in his seat and twisted the key in the engine.  “But don’t lie.” He put the car in drive and sped out of the nearly empty parking lot.  “Breaking and entering, assault and battery, and resisting arrest.”

There was no emotion in his face or voice; he might as well have been reading out of a phone book.  If he regretted his actions that had landed him in prison he didn’t show it. Neil aimed for the same calm and failed miserably.  “I can’t fill out the form because I can’t give my social security number.”

“Are you here illegally?”

It was a logical conclusion that hadn’t occurred to Neil.  “No. I was born outside of D.C.”

Andrew turned without signaling and punched the gas, the engine purring in response.  He waved a hand in Neil’s direction. “What’s your next question?”

“Oh.  Um, how did you get into racing?”

“I did the county fair quarter horse thing as a kid.  When I made parole Wymack was waiting. Got me and Aaron emancipated, sent us to jockey school.”  He turned onto the highway and Neil realized they were heading back to the track. “Why can’t you put down your social security number?”

Neil’s nails dug into his palms, and he drew a shaking breath.  “There are people who want to hurt me.”

Andrew snorted.  “No shit.”

Neil wasn’t sure if that was a commentary on his personality, or simply a statement of fact given the condition he’d been in when they’d met.  He decided to treat it as the latter. “My name...it’s not the same. If my real name gets out there, these people will find me.”

The only sign Andrew gave that he heard him was a restless tapping of fingers on the steering wheel.  They pulled into the parking lot at the track a few minutes later. Andrew turned off the engine but didn’t get out.  “Your parents?”

“My parents are dead.”  For a moment, Neil smelled blood, and his eyes dropped to his clean hands.  “These people, they worked for my father.”

“This is not an insurmountable problem.”  He glanced at Neil. “If we can fix it for you, you will stay?”

“How the hell can you fix it for me?”  Images of knives flashed through his mind; he could still feel the recoil of the handgun he had carried for years, hear its report in his ears.  He didn’t think he’d ever actually killed someone, mostly because he’d always aimed for legs and shoulders, but he couldn’t be sure.

“Renee has connections.”

Neil stared at him in shock.  Renee was sweet, so much so that she made Neil uncomfortable.  In all the hours she had spent working with him she had never been anything but patient, with him or the horses.  He had been waiting for the other shoe to drop, and apparently here it was.

Andrew’s mouth twitched up, just for a second.  “You think you’re the only liability here?” He got out of the car and grabbed the shopping bags. Neil followed him out into the parking lot, rolling the papers up in his hand.  “It’s Wymack’s specialty. Or stupidity, depending.”

Neil wanted to ask, but he wasn’t sure it was his business.  A couple of the younger colts were out getting tacked while Wymack hovered, talking to Aaron.  Andrew held out the bags. Neil took them reflexively, and Andrew swiped the papers from his other hand.  Wymack trailed off when he saw them.

“Got that sorted?”

“We will,” Andrew said, and Neil wished he had the same confidence.  “I need to borrow Renee later.”

“Then go work your damn filly, she’s bouncing off the walls.”

The rest of the day flew by, and the next.  Nicky served as a welcome distraction, alternating between scolding Andrew for not taking him with them when they went shopping and trying not to gawk too much at Neil.  Neil wanted to forget about the whole licensing fiasco, but it revisited him each night when he settled into the dormitory Wymack had secured for him. The room was tiny, with cinderblock walls and a bathroom that he couldn’t even stretch his arms out in without hitting a wall, but it was the first real bed he’d had in years.  Yet every night dreams of Lola, of Romero, of the ghost of his father or, somehow worse, his mother, didn’t fail to send him gasping upright.

By the third day his sleepless nights were beginning to take their toll.  He was slower on his sunrise run around the grounds, and it took him three tries to get Queenie’s leg wraps on right.  Wymack took one look at him, the almost bruised color to the bags under his eyes, and refused to let him do more than take the horses on their rest day out for walks.  

Vinnie was nibbling on the grass on the edge of the walkway when Renee found him.  “Here,” she said, passing him a sheet of paper. He opened it up to show a name and a number, with an address in Columbia underneath it.  “He’s a judge that my foster mother’s partner knows. He’s worked with people like us before, he understands the stigma. She talked to him, he’ll do the name change, no questions asked.”

Neil thought he was going to fall over in shock.  Vinnie tugged at his lead shank, trying to get to better grass, and he untangled his tongue and his feet.  “People like us.”

She gave him a beatific smile.  “Andrew said he told you.”

“He told me you were a liability.”  He flinched at the way that came out and felt his face heat.  “All of you. Us.”

Renee laughed.  “He does have a way with words.  We’re not so different, Neil. If you ever want to talk about it, I’m happy to share more.  But not now, I’ve got to go get ready for the first.”

*****

There was something surreal, walking out of the judge’s office a few days later, knowing that he was now permanently Neil Josten.  He hadn’t been anything but a fiction for so long, a side character in a movie, expendable and unimportant. He wasn’t sure he knew how to be anything else.

Renee was wrong about the judge asking no questions in the end.  After seeing Neil’s real birth certificate and making the connection, the judge had asked just two: “Are you still in danger?”  And when Neil had nodded with only a second’s hesitation, “Can you tell me from who?”

When he got back to the stables, Andrew just lifted one blond eyebrow at him.  Neil nodded, then felt the smile breaking across his face like a wave. He didn’t know if this was the beginning of the end, if he was somehow lighting a beacon for his father’s people to follow.  The judge had assured him that he would do what he could to wipe all record of Nathaniel Wesninski’s existence. He might even get the FBI involved, have them keeping an eye out for the Malcolms. It should have been terrifying, the idea of law enforcement anywhere near him after all his mother had done to keep him out of their hands, but he found he didn’t even care.  Later that day, when he sat down at Wymack’s desk with the application again in front of him, he nearly tore the paper with the pen Andrew handed him as he signed his name. _Neil A. Josten_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all so much for the comments, they make my day!


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Neil starts riding in the schooling races necessary for him to earn his license to ride in real races, and stumbles onto something he doesn't expect. Andrew finds that he can't look away.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning for a forced (not public) outing.
> 
> Definitions:
> 
> Break - the start of a race. Horses "break" from the starting gate.

Neil rode Whisper in his first-ever schooling race.  Wymack had spent a couple of days explaining what kind of ride he wanted Neil to give; Dan had done her best to talk him through it.  There were seven other apprentices there, all trying to earn the right to ride in actual races. Wymack had told him the result didn’t matter, just the ride did.

All the same, Neil wasn’t going to lie, not to himself: he wanted to win.

But when he jogged out onto the track next to the pony rider, his mind went disconcertingly blank.  The stands were practically empty; his main audience was the railbirds and the other trainers, who were all clustered near the home stretch, coffees in hand.  None of them seemed particularly stressed. Some were on their phones, one not even looking towards the track.

A couple of the jockeys were calling to each other.  Neil wasn’t sure if they were just talking shit or were actually angry.  They approached the gate, the horses milling around and pinning their ears.  Whisper stayed calm and quiet, and he scratched the base of her mane, trying to take comfort in her steadiness.

_ What if she doesn’t break?  What if she just stands there, and the other horses run, and I am laughed back into the streets?  What if she breaks a leg, and it’s all my fault? What if _ — 

Before his brain could ask that last dire question he caught a flash of gold and black out of the corner of his eye.  He looked, just as the gate attendant took Whisper’s bridle. It was Andrew, watching. There was no particular expression on his face; he might as well have been staring at the blank screen of a television.  But he had a race in an hour, he should’ve been relaxing in the clubhouse. 

Neil’s nerves settled as the gate clanged shut behind Whisper’s hindquarters.  Wymack’s words came back:  _ Whisper breaks slow.  Let her find her stride.  Stay near the rail. At the five-eights pole, turn her loose. _

A couple more horses loaded, and Neil leaned forward, knuckles pressed into Whisper’s neck.  He felt her muscles coil underneath him. The bell rang and the gate sprang open, and Whisper leaped.  

The first surging strides took him by surprise.  He’d ridden practice starts before, but eight horses breaking at once drew each other on like a cresting wave.  By the time he found his balance he was near the back of the pack. Whisper’s stride smoothed out, and Neil remembered his job involved more than just staying on.  

There was a horse at his left hip, and he sent the mare forward a little to give them a clear shot to get close to the rail with a tug on the left rein.  She settled in, just behind a bay, matching the other horse stride for stride. The three-eighths pole flashed by, and Neil wondered where the the hell the first two furlongs had gone.  He looked around, trying to find an opening to send Whisper through. One opened up between the bay in front of him and a gray who was drifting a little wide. He asked Whisper to go, and she went.

Just as they were about to shoot through the gap, the bay surged, closing it.  Whisper was forced to ease up her stride, and Neil looked around for another way past.  He ended up steering her behind the gray, trying to get around the outside. The gray drifted again, pushing them much farther out than he had meant to be.   _ Shit. _  Wymack had told him to stay near the rail, and here he was out in no-man’s land.

Whisper answered when he asked for more, lengthening her stride and easing past the gray.  As soon as they were in the clear, he turned her more towards the rail, angling to the finish line that was looming up way too soon.  A chestnut flashed under, several lengths in front of him, then a brown, then another chestnut.  _ Fuck _ .

Whisper and the bay she’d been next to at the beginning of the race crossed underneath the wire at the same time.  He wasn’t sure which of them was fourth and which fifth. Standing in his stirrups, he asked the mare to slow her stride, and she listened obediently, cantering out for another furlong before coming back to a trot.  The winning jockey was calling out that he was the king of the world, until another reminded him he wasn’t getting paid extra for winning. That shut the guy up, and Neil shook his head as he trotted back to Wymack, patting Whisper’s sweaty neck apologetically.

Wymack took her reins and checked her over as he led her to the paddock.  Neil dismounted and undid his saddle, stepping on the scale as required after every race.  When he got the clear he returned to where a beaming Nicky was holding the horse. 

“High five!” Nicky hollered, holding his hand up high enough Neil probably would’ve had to hop to reach it.

“We lost,” Neil said flatly.  “I completely fucked it up.”

Wymack crossed his arms.  “What, you think you should’ve ridden it perfectly?  You rode a clean race and got her home sound.”

“And that’s it?”

“That’s enough for now.”  They started walking back to the stables; Andrew was nowhere to be seen, and Neil felt a pang of disappointment.  Dan spent the rest of the time before the first race going through his ride stride-for-stride with him on film, showing him other paths, other openings, other things to consider.  He filed it all away to review later. 

The afternoon passed in a blink.  As much as Neil wanted to meditate on his ride, there were horses to prep.  Aaron guided Percy to a win in an unrated sprint stakes; Andrew ended up third in the same race on one of Mosher’s youngsters, a colt who had been a fifty-to-one shot.  Neil wasn’t sure which result excited him more.

He hovered around that night, long after Aaron and Nicky had left to celebrate, after Dan had left with Matt, Wymack’s kind-faced farrier, after Renee had gone to dinner with Piggy’s owner Allison for some reason.  He wanted to talk to Andrew about his race, to ask what he could have done better; he wanted to hear him talk about the sprint, how he had guided a horse most people said should be a claimer into third in a race too short to allow for a single mistake.

But he waited, and waited, and Andrew didn’t appear.  When Wymack finally left, Neil headed towards the clubhouse, keying himself in via the electronic lock.  The halls were mostly darkened, but he could see a light under the door to the jockey’s room. He listened for a moment, but couldn’t hear anything.  Silently, he eased the door open and crept inside.

In the far corner of the room, he could just make out two figures in the dim light.  A few soundless steps and he could see more clearly. It was Andrew and a jockey Neil recognized from Rhemann’s stable; Andrew had the other man pressed against the wall, chest to chest, Andrew’s hands trapping the other’s at shoulder height, their fingers slightly interlaced.  They were so lost in each other’s mouths that they didn’t even notice Neil. His instincts shouted at him to leave; he had no right to witness this; but it took him a moment before he could turn away and slink out the way he had come.

He meant to go straight to his dorm but he found himself in front of Queenie’s stall instead.  She popped her head over the door to nudge his shoulder, and he stroked her face absently. There was an aching feeling, deep in his gut, that he didn’t have a name for.  When he was too tired to stand, he stumbled back to his room and collapsed on his bed, only to dream of chasing a shadow in the whispering wind.

*****

The next morning, Neil was uncommonly quiet as he tacked Queenie.  Andrew found his eyes kept drifting in that direction, drawn by the way he seemed curled in on himself.  Wymack had said Neil was unhappy with his own performance in the schooling race the day before, though nobody else thought he’d done poorly.  It seemed like an extreme reaction to an average first trip, but nobody really knew Neil well enough to guess what was going on in his head.

Halfway through the morning they were heading to the track together, Andrew on Mag and Neil on Snookie.  The silence was weightier than usual, dragging at Andrew’s skin and muffling the sound of hooves. “Are you going to be like this after every fucking race?” he finally asked.

Neil blinked at him owlishly.  “What?”

“Are you going to sulk every time a race doesn’t go your way?  I just want to know if I should put you out of your misery now or if you’ll eventually get over it.”

The corner of Neil’s mouth twitched up in a reluctant attempt at a smile.  “I’m fine.”

Andrew recalled Nicky telling him Neil had said the same thing when he was practically gutted.  “You that dumb, or you think I am?” Neil didn’t answer, just seemed to sag even more. “You’re too heavy.”

Neil’s brow furrowed.  “I think we weigh the same.”

Actually on his last weigh-in Neil was a couple pounds lighter than Andrew, but that was neither here nor there.  “Not literally. Your aids. A horse can feel a fly land on its skin, but you’re out there hauling them around by the mouth.  It fucks up their stride.”

“Oh.”  The smile settled, solidified into something real.  “That makes sense.”

They got onto the track and started trotting along the outside rail to let the horses warm up.  A cluster of Rhemann’s horses galloped past them in the other direction, Knox in the lead. Neil watched them go, then glanced at Andrew.  “Nicky doesn’t know, does he?”

Andrew stared at him for several strides.  “Know what?”

“About your boyfriend.”  

An unpleasant jolt went through Andrew, and Mag shied.  Andrew took his time getting him settled before replying, “What the fuck are you talking about?”

Neil shrugged, keeping his eyes on the track in front of them.  “I went into the jockey’s room last night. I didn’t know—I didn’t realize you were in there.” 

There was no judgment in his tone; only a sort of wistfulness that had Andrew wanting to drag him off the damn horse and into a private room somewhere.  It was a dangerous thought. Neil had never looked with interest at anyone in the months he’d been there, and had flat-out ignored the couple of people who had made suggestive remarks.  

Andrew shook himself mentally.  “Do you really not know what a hookup is?”

Neil made a noncommittal noise, and then they were back at the start and Wymack was waving them over.  Andrew shoved the conversation to the back of his mind. 

It was second nature to watch Neil more closely for the next few days, but there was no indication that the conversation had ever happened.  He was as obsessive over the horses as always; as dismissive of Nicky’s unsubtle comments; as oblivious to the handful of single grooms checking out his ass in the breeches Andrew had picked out.  Maybe his eyes met Andrew’s a little bit more, maybe his smile was a little bit freer, but Andrew suspected that was his usually piss-poor imagination. 

And maybe Andrew found himself working with Neil on getting a softer hand and a better eye in the saddle.  Neil was a study in contradictions: sharp with people, gentle with the horses; quick and subtle as a hidden switchblade.  He learned fast and argued every step of the way. It drove Andrew insane and kept drawing him back. He thought maybe he hated him, but he couldn’t look away.

One morning when Andrew hopped off Percy to hand him off to Seth, Wymack was standing by with Kacy.  “Tell me this isn’t going to be a problem,” he said, legging Andrew into Kacy’s saddle but looking at where Neil was talking to Dan.

“Oh, Coach.”  Andrew gathered up his reins as Kacy danced in a circle with Wymack at the center.  “Horses are your job, not humans. Remember?” 

Wymack huffed.  “Then don’t let it interfere.  Trot a mile, gallop a mile in two-ten, breeze a half.”

Kevin came down for Queenie’s second stakes, an ambitious mile and sixteenth grade two with one of the biggest purses Andrew had ever ridden for.  He knew Kevin was aiming for the Breeder’s Cup Distaff, the most prestigious race for fillies in the U.S. One part of him thought the whole concept of qualifying for that race was ridiculous.  Impossible. But another part of him, the part that should’ve been beaten into oblivion by the seventh foster home, couldn’t help but wonder  _ what if. _  He wanted to hold Kevin responsible for the resurrection of that long-dead sense of hope, of wanting, but he suspected the greater portion of blame lay with Neil and his clear-eyed faith in the filly.

Neil’s sixth schooling race fell on the same day, and Andrew was more than happy to send Kevin off after his little project so he could prepare for his full afternoon race card in peace.  Yet he couldn’t help but watch the race go off on the closed-circuit TV in the jockey’s room. 

Snookie was quite possibly the slowest horse in the barn.  She had never made it above the lowest level of allowance races, and for a lot of owners would’ve been a claimer long ago.  Wymack had chosen her for Neil because she was uncomplicated, but nobody expected Neil to actually win. He hadn’t been higher than third yet, but it didn’t matter.  These races were about experience, learning decision-making, gauging speed, figuring out timing.

Maybe somebody should’ve told that to Neil. 

He rode like his life depended on it, accepting the poor start Snookie gave him and letting her find her stride, then steadily threading her through the crowded pack.  Ten horses was a big field for a schooling race, but it looked like Neil was putting Andrew’s lessons to use. Someone stepped up to Andrew’s shoulder to watch; Aaron hummed as Neil shot a gap most apprentice jockeys would never have seen.  

They made it to the front of the pack, only one horse still out in front of them by several lengths.  Somehow Neil managed to find a competitive streak in the mare nobody else had ever unearthed. She pinned her ears back and charged.  Aaron shook his head as she nosed past the other horse just as they passed under the wire. “Maybe he’ll be less annoying now.”

“I wouldn’t count on it,” Andrew replied, stopping in front of his locker to pull on Mosher’s silks for the first race.

Aaron gave him a strange look as he stripped.  “You could have told me, you know.” Andrew shot him a glare that was a bit muffled by the shirt Aaron was pulling over his head.  “I see the way you look at him.”

“Fuck you.”

Aaron was unimpressed by the venom Andrew put in his voice.  Downside to having shared a uterus, he supposed, though it used to work.  Or maybe Andrew was losing his touch. “What, you think I give a shit after everything we’ve been through the past eight years?  Maybe when Nicky first took us in I wasn’t as supportive as I could’ve been—”

“You were a homophobic asshole, you mean.”

Aaron clenched his jaw, then forcibly relaxed.  “Yeah, maybe. But do you really think I didn’t notice you conveniently disappearing with guys all this time?”

Andrew turned away; he didn’t need to have this discussion right now.  Or ever, really, if he had his way. But Aaron wasn’t done. He stepped in front of Andrew, not touching, but refusing to be ignored.  “You’re my fucking brother, Andrew, whether you want to admit that or not. You never help anyone with their riding, but you’re spending every morning with that moron and you expect me not to see it?”

Andrew reached for his boots, but Aaron grabbed them and held them behind his back.  “Say something, asshole.”

“Stay out of my fucking business.”  Andrew shoved Aaron in the chest, hard enough that he stumbled back into the lockers and dropped the boots.  Andrew snatched them up and sat on the bench to pull them on. A few heads turned around at the noise, but nobody moved to intervene.

“No,” Aaron said, low and furious, moving to stand in front of him.  “You don’t tell me a goddamn thing, you won’t even give me a chance. But here’s the thing, Andrew.  You might not realize it, you might not even give a shit, but I’m not who I was when I was sixteen. I was fucked up.  We all were. But I grew up. I get it now. You are who you are, and there’s nothing wrong with that. And you can go to hell if you think I’d say anything else.”

Aaron was gone before Andrew could find his voice, having snatched up his clothes and headed to the bathroom to finish changing.  They didn’t look at each other as they weighed in or went to the post. But there was a sort of irony that they rode one-two in a photo finish, Aaron’s horse edging past Andrew’s by a nostril.  When Andrew rode past Aaron standing in the winner’s circle, he gave him a two-fingered salute, and couldn’t help but laugh when Aaron flipped him off in return.

The energy was building like a storm throughout the afternoon, the crowd swelling as the last race approached.  When Andrew had donned his hideous orange-and-white silks and headed to the paddock, he could feel the oppressive weight of it.  Queenie was tossing her head as Andrew reached her, a little more restless than she had been the last couple of races. Neil was murmuring to her, whatever nonsense bullshit he always did, but he flashed Andrew a grin as beautiful and blinding as lightning while Wymack settled the saddle on the filly’s back.

As soon as Andrew settled in the saddle and felt Queenie crackling underneath him, he knew they had it.  A minute and forty five seconds after the bell, they swept under the wire more than two lengths in the lead, the screams of the crowd suddenly deafening.  Electricity crashed over him, through him, and he struggled to catch his breath. 

When he reached the paddock after the obligatory photographs he practically flung himself off the horse.  It was too much; too strong; he had almost let himself get swept away, and now Neil was looking at him with that damn look in his eyes.  Wymack took the saddle from him and he strode towards the clubhouse, fighting the tiny tremors in his hands.

He hadn’t gotten far when jogging feet caught up to him.  “Don’t you want to celebrate?” Neil asked. 

“I want nothing.”

Neil made an exasperated noise.  “Would it kill you to let something in?”

_ It almost did last time. _  The thought was so loud for a moment Andrew thought he had spoken; maybe he had, judging by the sudden void of expression on Neil’s face.  But no; his lips were still firmly shut. He walked away, and Neil did not follow.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all so much for the comments! If you're enjoying this, please spread the word!


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Neil earns the right to ride in actual races, and the gang goes out to celebrate. A ban on talking about horses ends up leading to some unexpected results. Meanwhile, Andrew just keeps winning, and Wymack brings him along with a few horses to Baltimore for some upper-tier racing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We're really heading towards homestretch here! A lot goes on in this chapter, so buckle up! Slightly NSFW (finally!). I don't think there are any warnings for this one. But, uh, don't hate me.

Everything seemed to be back to normal the next day.  Wymack kept giving him new horses to ride, Andrew still gave him exercises to work on in the saddle, he kept learning and perfecting the thousand little details that made the difference between a win and a loss.  The thrill of guiding Snookie to the front had not left him, and he was determined to make it happen again. 

The memory of the agony that had rippled through Andrew’s eyes in that brief second after that glorious race hadn’t left him either.  

He still didn’t know what he had done to cause that reaction; his words had seemed innocent enough.  Sometimes he thought he had imagined it. Andrew was always so contained, so self-possessed. Then his mind drifted to that night in the dark jockey’s room, and he wondered.

Wymack had him entered in every schooling race in reasonable driving distance, which meant three times a week he was heading out on the track.  Some were uglier than others; he was fouled badly by another apprentice in Aiken, nearly crashing into the rail in an attempt to avoid a collision.  Dan had been furious, filing an objection, and the other jockey had been suspended for dangerous riding. But he got to taste victory a few more times; each time made him hungrier for more.

It was also in Aiken that he finally earned his license to ride in real race, with a win in his twenty first schooling race.  He couldn’t stop staring at it. It had his picture on it— _ his _ picture, with his eyes and his hair.  Usually if he saw himself in the mirror, all he could see was his father, in the iciness of his eyes, the cut of his mouth.  But Apprentice Jockey Neil Josten did not look like Nathan Wesninski. 

He looked like himself. 

When they got back to Palmetto, Dan declared that they were all going out to celebrate.  Even Seth agreed, which Neil suspected would make Andrew decline. He wished he could refuse to go, but that was a hard thing to sell when it was supposed to be in his honor.  He wasn’t sure why he felt relieved when Andrew just listened to Dan’s suggestion and gave a curt nod.

Before Neil could head to the dorm to shower, Nicky handed him a bag.  “I’ve been hanging onto this for weeks, waiting for an excuse. It’ll fit, Andrew told me your size.”

Neil peeked into the bag to see a pile of black fabric.  “Uhh…”

“You can’t go out in your riding clothes, and we can’t be seen with you in the other shit you wear.”

He wanted to protest, but he knew he’d lose.  Gritting his teeth the whole way, he jogged back to his room.  When he emerged again, wearing the outfit that did in fact fit, it was to find Andrew’s sleek black car parked in front of his building.  He slipped into the back seat next to Aaron.

“Damn,” Nicky swore vehemently when he saw Neil.  Aaron smacked him in the side of the head and Nicky held up his hands.  “I’m just saying.”

They ended up at the same diner Andrew had taken him to all those months ago.  Dan had brought her boyfriend Matt along, and the huge farrier raised an eyebrow at Andrew when he ordered ice cream but didn’t comment.  The rest of them ate their healthy dinners while conversation ranged across a variety of topics. Neil participated when it was about horses, and mostly just listened to the Nicky, Renee, Dan, and Matt carry on the rest.  It had been so long since he had seen a movie, or even watched TV, that he was quickly lost but he didn’t mind. Aaron joined in here and there, but Andrew was as silent as Neil. It was kind of nice, sitting there, letting their voices wash over him.   

He had assumed they’d head back to the track afterwards, but Andrew led the way to another building a few minutes’ drive away.  Neil could feel the bass in his bones from the parking lot, and he glanced up at the sign apprehensively. Eden’s Twilight. 

Andrew led the way into the club, bypassing the line with a nod at the bouncers, who greeted Aaron and Nicky with complicated handshakes.  They made their way through the crush of people to the bar. Neil’s skin crawled at the feel and noise of so many bodies around him, and he tucked himself in close enough behind Andrew he could feel his body heat through the thin fabric of his shirt.

The bartender gave Andrew a broad smile when he saw him, and set immediately to filling a tray.  “New meat?” he asked, gesturing with his chin at Neil.

Andrew waved his hand over his shoulder where the others were clearing off a table.  “Bonding activity.”

“Bonding?  Or bondage?  Because I’d want in on the second one.”  The bartender laughed at the expression on Neil’s face.  “Guess this one’s vanilla. How many DDs?”

Andrew held up two fingers, and two bottles of water and two cans of soda joined the variety of other drinks.  As Andrew hefted the tray, the bartender cocked his head in what must have been a silent question, as Andrew gave a brief shake of his own before turning away.  The group descended on the drinks, Renee snagging one bottle of water while Neil took the other. 

Nicky, Matt, and Aaron were each halfway through their second drinks when Nicky nudged Aaron.  “Look who’s here.”

“I know,” Aaron said, raising a hand in a little wave.  “I invited her.” Neil followed his gaze to see a jockey he recognized from Pruitt’s stable, an apprentice like him.  He tried to recall her name—Katie? Katelyn? —as she headed in their direction with a wide grin. 

Nicky greeted her with a hug, and Aaron with a drink.  The rest absorbed her into the group as if she was one of them.  It was hard to hear conversation over the pounding music, and after a while Neil didn’t even try.  Eventually everyone drifted off to the dance floor except Neil and Andrew, and Neil scooted closer.

“What do you think—” 

“No horses,”  Andrew interrupted.  “I hereby ban you from any discussion of horses for the rest of the night.”

Neil shut his mouth and searched for something else.  He had so much he wanted to talk about: his first real race, coming up in a few days; Wymack’s plans for Piggy and Queenie; what Andrew’s first races had gone like.  His eyes fell on his...friends, out on the floor. It looked like Seth had partnered up with a random girl in a very short dress. Nicky was teaching Renee some sort of dance, while Aaron and Katelyn were grinding together and Matt and Dan had given up any pretence of dancing and were just making out near the wall.

“Do you remember what you said a while ago, that we’re all liabilities?”  Andrew raised an eyebrow at him, and he took that as invitation to go on. “Renee told me about her gang, and Dan about the...you know.”

“Stripping,” Andrew supplied.

It was still hard to picture tough-as-nails Dan letting herself be objectified like that, but he nodded.  “Yeah. And she told me about Seth and Matt, and Aaron.” Andrew stiffened a little at that but didn’t reply.  “But what about Nicky? He seems so, I don’t know. Normal.”

Andrew drained the last of his drink and stood, gathering the glasses.  His eyes strayed to Nicky and he paused for a long moment before lifting the tray.  “Nicky had the misfortune of being born a Hemmick.”

Neil thought about that while he watched Renee laughing at something Nicky said.  His attention drifted to Andrew, who was now leaning across the bar while the bartender talked.  He had never figured out the relationship between the cousins. Aaron barely talked to anyone, but he did talk to Nicky, even if three quarters of their conversations sounded more mocking than anything.  Andrew spoke more to Wymack and Neil than he did to either of the other two. It seemed strange, but then, Neil had never had a real family. He was still musing when Andrew returned with a full tray and everyone swarmed the table again.

This time Nicky tried to coax Neil out onto the dance floor with him.  Neil refused. “Take Andrew,” he said, glancing at the twin in question.  Andrew’s dead-eyed glare in response had Neil grinning. 

“Are you kidding?” Nicky said.  “I value my life too highly. Come on, Neil, it’ll be fun!”  Neil shook his head, and Nicky gave an exaggerated sigh. “Both of you are impossible.  No wonder you get along. Assholes in a pod, or whatever.”

Nicky disappeared into the fray and Neil leaned back in his chair.  Despite the noise, it was oddly comfortable, sitting there. He spun his water bottle cap, watching it travel in a zigzag until it finally came to rest against the tray.  Before he could reach for it, Andrew stole it and flipped it through his fingers, then set it spinning again. They traded it back and forth, until a particularly enthusiastic spin from Neil sent it ricocheting off the table and rolling away.  

Andrew watched it disappear among dancing feet.  “Ten bucks says someone sprains an ankle on that fucker.”

Neil laughed.  “At least it won’t be either of us.”  Andrew hummed and sipped his drink, and they watched the dancers for a while.  “You don’t know how to dance?”

“I don’t dance,” Andrew corrected.  

“But you know how.”  He took Andrew’s silence as confirmation.  “I don’t, not really.” He could feel Andrew’s eyes on him.  “I’ve been on the run since I was ten. Never really got a chance.”

“Yes, you’re a right sob story.”  He finished the last drink on the tray and got to his feet.  “Let’s round these idiots up.”

Matt and Dan had retreated to his truck, and nobody was inclined to interrupt them.  Aaron and Nicky opted to get a ride home with Katelyn, which left Renee and Seth climbing into the back of Andrew’s car.  Seth turned out to be a weepy drunk, which was interesting given that sober, every third word out of his mouth was likely to be an insult.  

Back at the track, it took all three of them to get Seth safely into his room.  They settled him fully clothed on his bed, and Renee found a mostly-empty trash can and put it by his face.  They closed the door on tearful vows of love and devotion and shook their heads at each other. 

“I should have recorded that,” Andrew muttered. 

“Blackmail material,” Neil said, nodding.  “Hopefully he won’t choke on his own vomit in there.”

Renee looked a bit concerned at that.  “Maybe I should sit with him for a little while.”

Andrew shrugged.  “Do what you want, Christian girl.”

She wished them a good night, and Neil turned towards the stairs to his room, Andrew behind him.  When Andrew headed up, rather than down to the parking lot, Neil followed him, intrigued.

At the top, Andrew wrestled with the door until it opened up onto the roof.  The dormitories had been built along the backstretch of the main track, but they could see the dark expanse of the whole grounds from the edge, the walkways alone illuminated.  Neil wondered what it would look like during the races, the horses thundering around the far turn, dueling it out as they got ready to head towards the home stretch. He could just about feel it: the wind burning his face, the sting of dirt flung up by pounding hooves, the powerful rhythm of the horse underneath him.  Just a few more days…

A tiny pebble hitting his leg interrupted his thoughts.  “I thought I told you no horses tonight.” 

“I wasn’t saying anything.”

“You don’t have to.  You’re like a fucking silent movie, you’ve got giant subtitles under your face all the time.  And it always says the same damn thing.” Andrew settled on the edge of the roof and held his hands out like he was framing something.  “Horse.”

Neil wanted to protest, but the laugh that bubbled out of him ruined his indignation.  He dropped down onto the edge next to Andrew, enjoying the pleasant swooping sensation in his stomach that being up this high always gave him.  “What else did you want to talk about?”

“Nothing.  Anything.” Andrew kicked his feet so they bounced off the bricks.  “Books. Music. Whether Freud really had an affair with his wife’s sister, I don’t care.”  

They sat in silence for a while, the cool spring air acting like a tonic, waking Neil more effectively than caffeine.  He turned to face Andrew, pulling his knees up to his chest. “Why don’t you dance?”

Andrew went unnaturally still for a moment; Neil wasn’t sure if he was even breathing, though his expression did not change.  “I don’t like people touching me.”

Neil frowned.  “Like, crowds?”

“Anyone.”  He looked colorless in the cold light of the moon, pale and small in a way he never seemed in daylight.  Neil thought back to that night in the jockey’s room, the way he had held the other man’s hands against the wall, and wondered if it was less passion and more precaution.

Something told him he didn’t want to know the reason behind that.

“Noted,” was all he could think of to say.  It sounded stupid to his own ears, but Andrew looked at him sharply.  There was an almost predatory focus in his eyes as he held Neil’s stare, that only intensified when they dropped to Neil’s mouth.   _ Oh. _

It had been years since he had kissed anyone, so many he had lost count.  The few times he had succumbed to curiosity had somehow always ended in his mother finding out, and since she’d been gone any interest he’d had just fizzled out before it got anywhere.  But this...Neil felt dizzy, reckless; it was intoxicating. Whether it was born of teetering on the edge of the building or just from sitting so close to Andrew he didn’t know.

“Andrew.”  It came out huskier than he meant it to, and he felt heat rise in his face.

“Shut up,” Andrew said, but he reached up and caught Neil’s face in his hands.  “Yes or no?”

Neil knew if he said no, Andrew would stop, no questions asked.  He didn’t know why that felt like the bigger risk. There was a part of him, his common sense maybe, that was buzzing in his head, but it was all static, nothing more than a badly tuned radio.  Neil found he could only murmur, “Yes,” and lean in.

Andrew closed the distance between them like he was on the track, strong and sure.  His mouth was harsh but his hands were gentle as they slid the short distance up into Neil’s hair.  Neil fought back a shiver, not wanting to do anything to give Andrew a reason to stop. He had kissed people, yes; but it had never felt like this.  Never before had his world shrunk down to chapped lips and two hands, to the faint rasp of stubble against his chin, to hitches of breath and the scent of soap and whisky.

His fingers ached to hold on to something, to Andrew; Neil tucked them behind his back, grabbing onto his own wrist instead.  He could feel his pulse, rabbit-quick against his fingers, matching the pounding in his ears. 

Too soon, Andrew was pulling back.  Neil opened his eyes to find Andrew’s still closed, his lashes fanned against his cheeks, the tips silver in the moonlight.  He couldn’t help himself; he brushed his lips against Andrew’s temple softly, a whisper of a kiss. Andrew gave a tiny shiver and opened his eyes, their usual hazel practically swallowed up by pupil as they stared into Neil’s.  Without a word he pushed to his feet and disappeared down the stairs, leaving Neil to look out across the empty track below.

*****

Andrew had always suspected Neil would be dangerous to him.  He just hadn’t anticipated that he’d so voluntarily succumb. 

His days went as they always did, riding and watching film and eating and more riding.  But now, after the last race was done and the grounds had gone quiet, he found himself seeking him out, night after night, to get drunk on the strange wine that was Neil.

He still hadn’t invited Neil back to his house, and he hadn’t visited Neil’s room either.  He wasn’t sure why not, exactly. Sometimes as he drove home, still tasting Neil’s mouth on his tongue, he considered it.  But he’d had so few good dreams in a life plagued by nightmares, and he didn’t want to wake up from this one.

Spring eased its way towards summer, and Andrew somehow just kept finding his way into the winner’s circle.  A hoof abscess had interrupted Piggy’s training for two weeks and destroyed Allison’s dreams of Triple Crown races, but he had come back better than ever and was slaying the competition at a mile and a quarter.  Queenie, too, seemed unstoppable. She would still play around and give everybody shit on the training track, but put her in a gate with a dozen horses around her and she was all business. Her two-year-old campaign with the Moriyamas had been a disaster, but she was undefeated as a three year old, and the murmurs were starting among the railbirds.  A handful more owners pulled out of Nevermore, some joining Foxhole, some going to Rhemann or Mosher, or sending their horses across the country to Santa Anita for the richer purses and less pretension.

The murmurs got louder.

Andrew had always turned down more offers to ride than he’d accepted, but by midsummer it was becoming ridiculous enough he finally had to hire an agent.  Neil started working Andrew’s horses some mornings so he could have the time to go meet new horses and their owners. But Andrew made sure he was there the first time Wymack boosted Neil into Queenie’s saddle.  He committed the fanatical gleam in those beautiful eyes to memory, then found his voice and talked Neil through the filly’s laundry list of quirks.

It was strange, watching this horse that he knew so well.  She moved like a dancer, lightness and grace masking her explosive power.  And for some reason with Neil on her back she didn’t pull her usual bullshit.  Neil sat quiet, all of Andrew’s lessons having finally sunken in, and Queenie submitted to his invisible signals with an arched neck, ears flicked back as if listening.  Andrew wondered if he was telling her more of his stupid stories. Then they hit the mile pole and Neil turned her loose. For a second, Andrew thought Neil was going to get blown right over her ass, she shot forward so quickly.  But he managed to stay with her, hands soft on her mouth, and they finished the half-mile breeze in a time that would rival the fastest colts in the world.

Wymack looked at Andrew with his eyebrows raised.  Andrew just shrugged, but there was a strange warmth underneath his sternum and he had to fight not to smile when Neil came trotting back, gleaming in the early morning sun.  He had that image in his head that night when they found themselves on the rooftop at sunset, the clouds glowing pink and orange as the precursors to a storm rolled in.

He had started allowing Neil to touch him, his hair, his shoulders.  It had been a test at first, an excuse to walk away, to reclaim some semblance of sanity.  But Neil never strayed. He never asked for more than what Andrew offered, and it became too easy to let the boundaries slip.

That night Neil clung to Andrew’s shoulders like a drowning man when Andrew pushed him back against the door to the roof.  The ridges of scars across his body pressed into Andrew’s hands. They were grounding, so distinctly Neil they kept Andrew from drifting; he wondered what they would feel like under his lips, if they would taste different than the salt of his neck or the sweetness of his mouth.

“I wish you weren’t going to Pimlico,” Neil said, the words breaking the tenuous spell between them.

Andrew huffed and tugged him down for another kiss.  “You get your damn filly all to yourself for two weeks, I’d think you’d be happy.”

Neil pulled back, that stupid crooked smile on his stupidly beautiful lips.  “I’d rather have you both here, with me. I don’t like Baltimore.”

Andrew shut him up again.  His fingers dipped into the snug waistband of the breeches Neil had yet to change out of, and Neil made a little noise in the back of his throat.  “Yes or no, Neil?” Andrew whispered into his mouth.

“Yes.  Always yes.”

Another time Andrew would correct him.  But for now, it was too entertaining to make him fall apart under his hands, to hear that voice go raw choking out his name, to feel that lithe body go taut and loose all at the same time.

The next morning started too early, loading Piggy, Mag, Vinnie, and Percy into the van and then getting in his car and driving to Pimlico in Baltimore.  Seth was in the van with Wymack instead of Nicky, and Andrew was not particularly looking forward to the next couple of weeks. He didn’t much care that this was his chance to ride in some grade one stakes; he made a perfectly good living off what he did.  But his agent had found some owners and trainers willing to let Andrew ride his way, and there weren’t enough of those in the world to make it easy to turn them down.

The hotel was nice, bordering on luxurious; the track, though one of the most historically significant in the country, was not.  The state of Maryland was debating tearing the damn thing down, and after testing out the footing and seeing the rundown stalls, Andrew was inclined to strike a match and get them started.

It was too bad Neil wasn’t here with him, he decided, once he saw the gorgeous horses he’d be riding.  The junkie would be salivating. When he worked them the first time and felt them responding to his lightest aids like a sports car, smooth and perfect, he grudgingly decided his agent maybe knew what she was about. 

Andrew’s hot streak continued, until he was sick and tired of people fawning over him and shut off his phone.  It was easy to win on horses like these, the best bred in the country. He just had to stay out of their way. When Percy came in second in his first grade one, Wymack looked like he was going to have an aneurism.  Then Mag won his race, a grade three sprint; Andrew thought he was going to have to get ahold of a knife to keep Allison off of him. He was pretty sure punching a rich, beautiful female owner in the face would get him in some form of trouble, but eventually his threats did their job and she settled for kissing a blushing Seth on the cheek.

A storm rolled in and didn’t leave for two days, soaking the track and the grounds until everything had the disgusting soggy texture of an old kitchen sponge.  Half of his rides scratched, and he wasn’t going to complain. He sat in the clubhouse and texted Neil, who seemed to be on a win streak of his own. Unfortunately, experienced jockeys didn’t appreciate being shown up by a no-name apprentice, and suddenly every single horse Neil was riding was being tested for drugs.  They were clean, of course, but Dan had called Wymack to ask for some extra security in case anyone decided to take matters into their own hands.

The weather cleared in time for the grand finale, the Pimlico Special, the last major race of the season at the aging track.  Piggy swaggered past the other colts on their way to the post. It was funny, sometimes, how horses could act so human. They had this one in the bag, and they both knew it.

Piggy broke well, sweeping clear of the surging bodies and settling into the middle of the pack.  It was a mile and an eighth, and Andrew kept Piggy in check, keeping an eye on the horses in front. The gelding in the lead had a sprinter’s break but he wouldn’t last; his job was to set a grueling pace and wear out the others so the other colt from his stable, the favorite at three to two, would be able to pick them off in the last quarter mile. 

Two could play at that came, and Piggy was happy to bide his time.  Sure enough, the leader started to flag at the six furlong mark, the second place horse not long after.  Andrew saw his gap and sent Piggy through.

It happened so fast, he didn’t even know it was coming.  One second, Piggy was surging, in sync with the favorite along the rail.  The next, his front end was dropping out from underneath Andrew. There was a moment of weightlessness, of the sky, too bright and too blue above him, then the earth rushed up to meet him.  Something landed on him, crushing the breath out of him, and everything went black.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It'll be okay, I promise. Thank you so much for all your comments, they mean the world! And hey, if you like it spread the word! HMU [on Tumblr](https://fuzzballsheltiepants.tumblr.com) to yell at me or just say hi.


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The aftermath.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning for some joking fat-shaming among some of the jockeys, and for a more detailed description of Andrew's accident. 
> 
> Definition:
> 
> Two-minute clip - galloping at a speed of thirty miles an hour, a typical workout speed for a racehorse and about ten miles an hour slower than racing speed

Wymack’s new groom, Robin, was chattering in Neil’s ear as they headed back to the stable, Dan grinning at Bear’s head.  The horse’s injury the previous year had been severe enough nobody had known if he’d ever race again, but he had run well for Neil, coming in second by half a neck.  Neil still wondered if they would’ve won if he’d asked for more a couple of strides earlier, but the final time had been the best Bear had ever run a mile. He couldn’t complain.

They pulled up short when they came around the end of the row and saw Nicky in tears, wrapped up in Renee’s arms, Abby hovering nearby.  The sight of the vet made Neil’s stomach drop, and he glanced in Queenie’s stall. The filly just looked at him curiously, hay sticking out of her mouth, and Neil remembered Abby was there to check over Bear.  

“What happened?” Dan’s sharp voice cut through the buzzing in Neil’s ears.

“It’s Andrew,” Renee said, patting Nicky on the back.  “Piggy clipped heels coming around the turn and flipped over.”

The ground dropped from underneath Neil’s feet.  He could barely hear Dan’s cursing; he blinked, but spots still swam across his vision.  A tentative hand on his shoulder made him suck in some air, and the world solidified.

“...three cracked ribs and a broken arm,” Nicky was saying through loud sniffling.  “He’ll be okay, I’m just.” He drew in a shaky breath. “Yeah.”

Neil glanced over to see Robin looking at him in concern, her hand still squeezing his shoulder.  Nobody else seemed to notice his little moment, and he shook himself. The last thing Andrew needed was for people to learn about their  _ this _ when he had no say in it.  He found his voice. “Does Aaron know?”

Silence fell, and everyone looked at each other.  “Not yet,” Renee finally said. “He’s riding in the last race.”

Neil turned, leaving Bear to Dan.  The bell for the race rang just as he started into a jog.  He headed for the clubhouse rather than the paddocks; it would be easier to talk to Aaron in the relative quiet, away from the crowds and the press.

One of the TVs in the jockey’s room was turned to racing news, and Neil watched with the sound off as they replayed the video, over and over.  Clipped heels. It sounded so benign, just one horse’s front hooves hitting the hinds of another. Yet seeing it happen was terrifying: eleven hundred pounds of muscle and bone going down, tail arcing high in the air as the horse flipped, Andrew completely disappearing under the massive body.  The horse that Piggy had clipped had fallen too, but not quite as spectacularly. The late runners had swerved, trying to avoid worsening the pile-up, and then Piggy and the other horse had gotten up, galloping wild down the track until they were corralled by the pony riders. The other jockey had gotten to his feet within seconds.  Andrew had not.

Aaron came into the room on the sixth replay in the middle of a pack of jockeys, talking shit with one of them in a good-natured tone.  His face faltered when he saw Neil standing there, still in the silks he hadn’t bothered to change out of. “What happened?” The room fell quiet and everyone turned to look at them.

Neil swallowed down the lump in his throat.  “Andrew fell. He’s going to be okay, I guess, but he broke his arm and some ribs.”

A chorus of swearing went around the room.  Most of the jockeys weren’t too fond of Andrew; he won too much and cared too little; but there was solidarity in putting your life on the line next to each other day in and day out.  Someone found the remote and turned up the sound on the television and everyone gathered around Aaron. The room cringed as they watched Piggy start to fall, then erupted with sympathy groans when he rolled onto Andrew.  The sober-faced announcer repeated what Neil already knew, but for some reason it made him feel even worse, hearing it spelled out in that official voice. The door opened and Katelyn rushed in, scanning faces with a tight expression until she spotted Aaron. She rushed over and gathered him into her arms, and he clung on tight.

Neil turned away, leaving Aaron to his girlfriend’s care.  His feet carried him to the roof of his dorm. The grounds were still bustling like an ant hill below him, spectators leaving, trainers and owners talking, grooms cooling out and feeding.  Neil felt empty, far away from it all. 

Falls were an inevitable part of riding.  Everybody fell; Neil had been jarred loose off of Vinnie a few weeks earlier.  Mostly you were just a bit bruised and sore and got back on. But there was something about watching this—watching Andrew get hurt, and knowing he could do nothing to stop it—that made Neil feel even more helpless than he had when he’d been shivering out in the woods, bleeding.

He hadn’t meant to let this happen.  Andrew was supposed to be a diversion, something to fill the hours when he wasn’t riding and to learn from when he was.  But he was more than that now. Had been, since that first night up on the roof. Even before that, Neil realized; it had started when he’d seen Andrew in the jockey’s room that night, and it had felt like a knife twisting in his gut.

Neil had always been a liar; he’d been raised that way.  It was the only thing he knew to do to protect himself from the vicious truths he’d grown up with.  But he didn’t know when he’d gotten so good at lying to himself.

Queenie didn’t have any answers for him when he sought her out once everyone was gone for the night.  She nuzzled his cheek then stood for an endless minute, her face pressed against his chest as he slowly rubbed her ears.  When she eventually turned back to her hay, the steady rhythm of her chewing lulled him towards sleep, but he didn’t want to leave.  At least here, he wasn’t alone.

*****

Andrew was released from the hospital the next morning.  The most aggravating part of all of this was that he had to let Seth drive his car; he couldn’t shift with his right arm in a sling, let alone with the painkillers muddying his brain.  So he closed his eyes for the eight hours and pretended he didn’t hear the transmission trying to commit suicide every time Seth changed gears.

Sometimes he drifted into muddled dreams that he didn’t remember when he woke up, gasping, pain radiating through his chest.  The first time it happened he expected Seth to say something vicious, but he merely kept his eyes on the road and his mouth shut.

To distract himself, he thought about Neil.  At first, just his carved mouth and clever tongue, the curve of his ass in his breeches, the way the sun hit his eyes and made them look like the ocean in a postcard.  But as the road stretched on, he pictured different things. His hands, gentle with the horses, reverent on Andrew’s skin the few times he’d touched him. The little quips he sometimes made, breaking his too-serious silence.  The ferocity in his words when he had stood between Queenie and Kevin, a runaway nobody putting himself on the line for a horse he—loved. 

It was old habit to shy away from the word, but there was no other that he could use.  It was just so...Neil. The thought made Andrew’s chest ache more, and he willed himself back into sleep. 

They got back to Palmetto long after the races were done for the day.  Exhaustion pulled at every inch of Andrew’s body. Facing the others was more than he could manage just then.  He stayed in the passenger seat and texted Nicky to come and take him home.

He had fallen back into a doze when the driver’s side door cracked open and Nicky peered in at him.  It took all of about half a second before Nicky’s chin started wobbling. “Oh my god, Andrew…” His voice was thick with tears, and Andrew had no patience left to tolerate it.

“Get me home.”

“You don’t want to see everyone?  They’re all really worried about you.”

But Andrew had said what he needed.  He let his head drop back against the seat and closed his eyes.

Nicky didn’t push it.  He drove Andrew home. 

Andrew’s alarm went off at fuck-all o’clock the next morning.  He dug his phone out from the pocket of the sweatpants he hadn’t bothered to take off the night before and killed the alarm, but he knew almost immediately that more sleep was an impossibility.  

Fuck his stupid fucking body clock.

Getting out of bed was about as much fun as waxing his balls, but eventually he made it to his feet and into the bathroom.  His reflection was not his friend; he looked like he had gone twelve rounds with a professional boxer, his skin more purple than not.  He somehow managed to do at least a half-ass job bathing and getting dressed and met Nicky and Aaron downstairs. His brother looked him up and down.  “You look like you got run over by a horse.”

“Funny.”

After breakfast, half of which Andrew spilled on the table because his left hand was only useful for riding and fighting, he settled into the passenger seat and Nicky drove them to the track.  Andrew considered staying in the car once they got there; he wasn’t sure why he’d even come, it wasn’t like he could do anything, but the idea of sitting at home felt like drowning. He followed Nicky into the stables.

If he’d been expecting some sort of scene out of a movie, where they’d all come together and gather around, he would’ve been disappointed.  As it was, the normalcy of it helped something settle in his gut. Dan welcomed him back on her way to tack up a colt; Seth pretended he didn’t exist; and Renee greeted him with her usual smile, though concern stained her eyes.  Piggy stuck his head out over the half-door when he heard his voice, and Andrew rubbed his face for a moment, glancing over the colt's sleek body.  A few scrapes disrupted his gleaming coat but otherwise he looked unharmed, and a little knot of tension behind Andrew's eyes loosened.  


He was absolutely not looking around for Neil when Robin saw him and waved in the direction of the training track.  “He’s over there.” 

Curious, Andrew limped his way over, noticing Queenie’s stall was empty.  Wymack nodded at him as he hobbled up. “You look like shit.”

“Thank you.  I had no idea.”

Neil was galloping along the far turn at a two-minute clip, somehow looking even more in sync with Queenie than before.  Movement up the rail caught Andrew’s eye, and he saw a familiar head of black hair. Kevin’s eyes were trained on his horse, knuckles white where he grasped the rail.  Andrew watched Kevin instead of the horse; he already knew how the workout would go. But he didn’t know what Kevin would do with Andrew benched for a couple of months.

Kevin was arrogant, and stubborn, and rich enough he had always gotten his way.  He was also loyal as hell, and was the one who had first urged the Moriyamas to try to sign Andrew to an apprenticeship, back when he was still in juvie.  Andrew had refused—even on the county fair circuit, jockeys talked, and he knew what they did to their horses—and Kevin had gone to Wymack instead. 

He had told Andrew when he brought his furious filly to Foxhole that he was never letting anyone else up on her.  Neil even working her was a concession to the fact that Kevin had spotted him first. Too big to ride, he prided himself on sponsoring riding talent, and there were jockeys dotted all up and down the eastern half of the U.S. that owed their careers to him.  Thing was, he was usually right, and he knew it. 

Wymack wandered over to Kevin as Neil pulled up in front of them.  Andrew debated going over to see what they were saying, but the prospect of moving more than he had to was unappealing.  He saw the change in Neil’s eyes, from the exhilarated gleam he usually had after a ride to irritation and then doubt.

A couple of minutes later Neil left the track to head to the barn, but when he spotted Andrew he rode over to him instead.  Neil halted in front of him, studying him for a long moment. “You need an ice pack for that?” he asked, gesturing to Andrew’s entire body.

Andrew would have crossed his arms but the sling made it difficult.  “Well aren’t you just oozing with sympathy.”

Neil grinned and hopped off the filly, who was staring at Andrew with her ears as far forward as they would go.  “Aww, it’s okay, honey. It’s just a cast.”

“For the last time, Josten, I told you not to call me honey.”

Neil laughed and gently bumped Andrew’s good shoulder with his own.  Queenie was still staring at Andrew, fascinated; she stretched her neck out and sniffed carefully at the cast, then shook her head and snorted.  She reminded Andrew of a puppy. A big, potentially dangerous puppy. He reached up slowly with his left hand and rubbed her forehead.

“No, seriously,” Neil said, as they turned to head back to the barn.  “Is there even one inch of you that’s not bruised?”

“A few.”  Andrew glanced at Neil out of the corner of his eye and caught the flash of a smile.

“Hmm, five or six?”

“Get your mind out of the gutter.”  

The music of Neil’s laughter eased the last bit of tightness from his chest.  Nicky hurried over as they turned the corner and grabbed Queenie, and Robin boosted Neil into the saddle of his next ride, a two year old that belonged to someone Andrew didn’t even know.  It was so strange, watching all this happening and not being part of it; strange and unsettling.

“You okay?” Nicky asked, as he stripped Queenie’s tack off.  

“Stop asking stupid questions,” Andrew said, and he headed towards the clubhouse.  

Neil found him there, dozing on one of the couches, some time before the first race.  Andrew blinked against the disorienting feeling of waking up in a strange place. The pain relief might not be worth it, if it led to this fuzziness.  Then he pulled himself into a sitting position and changed his mind as his ribs protested. 

“Here,” Neil said, handing him a little tub of something.  Andrew took it reflexively; it chilled his hand and he looked inside.  “It’s those weird Dippin’ Dots things? I don’t even know what the hell they are, but I know you like ice cream and it was the only kind I could find on the grounds.”  He held out a little plastic spoon; his mouth tightened when he realized Andrew couldn’t really hold both. “Uhhh, hang on.”

He dropped onto the couch next to Andrew and took the cup from his unresisting fingers, then handed him the spoon.  “I’ll hold it, you eat.”

“You’re a crazy person,” Andrew said, but he dipped the spoon into the strange offering anyway.  It tasted like a weird combination of ice cream and styrofoam, the sweetness coating his tongue as it melted.  

Other jockeys started to file in; José saw Andrew sitting there with the spoon halfway to his mouth and called out, “You asshole, first you scare the shit out of all of us and now you’re eating fucking ice cream?”

“What?”  A chorus broke out among the others and they all gathered around.  

“Look at the rookie, kissing Minyard’s ass.”  Garret winked at Andrew; they’d hooked up once or twice over the years.  “This why you’re letting him steal your rides?”

“Fuck off, before I make you,” Andrew said, scooping as big a spoonful as he dared into his mouth. 

“Yeah, yeah, you talk a big game,” Robby said, grinning.  “I’d like to see you deal it out now.” He poked Andrew’s cast.

Andrew looked up at him, spoon still in his mouth, then swept out with his foot, hooking Robby’s ankles and yanking.  It hurt like hell, pulling on his ribs and every single bruised muscle in his body, but it was worth it when Robby toppled over backwards.  Everyone laughed, except Neil. Robby got to his feet, making a big show of dusting himself off, and he turned to Neil. “I think I bruised my ass.  Can I have some ice cream too?”

“Your fat ass can take a little bruising,” Garret said before Neil could respond.  “What it can’t take is more ice cream.”

“Go to hell.”  They kept bickering as they went over to their lockers.  Andrew scraped the bottom of the little cup and looked over at Neil, who had the uncomfortable expression of someone who was at the wrong birthday party.

“What.”

Neil made to stand up.  “I should go get ready.”

“You have time.”  

He hesitated for a moment, then settled back next to Andrew.  “Kevin and Wymack are trying to figure out what to do about Queenie.  She’s entered in that stakes at Aiken next weekend, and there’s the grade three in Charles Town next month.  They can’t decide if they should scratch or not.”

“Why wouldn’t you ride her?”

Andrew wanted to kiss the resulting expression off Neil’s face, but there were too many witnesses.  “You think I could?”

“Why the hell not?  She works for you as well as she works for me.”

“Tell Kevin that.”

Andrew shrugged.  “I don’t need to, he was there.”  

Neil grimaced.  “He doesn’t think I’ll be ready.”  

At least now he had an inkling of whatever it was they’d been arguing about that morning. “He never thinks anyone is.  Kevin’s always doom and gloom until he’s won already.”

Neil still looked dubious when he went to his locker to grab his stuff, then disappeared into the showers to change.  Andrew groaned his way to his feet and went down to the track. Kevin was in his box; Thea was with him for once, which meant there were people surreptitiously taking pictures with their phones.  It was tempting to just continue past the box down to ground level, but Andrew dropped into the chair next to Kevin.

They didn’t say much as the first race went to the post, nor the second.  Neil rode well in both, getting in a little traffic in the second but tactfully weaving out of it to bring the colt through.  It was another two year old Andrew barely knew, yet to break his maiden, but he finished strong for second half a length ahead of Renee, Andrew noticed with some amusement. 

“Still think he can’t pilot Queenie?”

Kevin snorted.  “You think some two-year-old allowance race means he can handle a stakes?  He’s an apprentice. He needs more experience.”

“And how’s he supposed to get that if nobody lets him ride?”  Andrew recognized that stubborn set to Kevin’s jaw. “You like history, Kevin.  You know how many apprentice jockeys have won the Kentucky Derby?”

Kevin didn’t answer, which was probably a good thing since Andrew didn’t actually know.  It was at least a few. Andrew let him stew. He knew how Kevin worked. He closed his eyes against the glare of the sun and let himself drift.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I told you it would all be okay! The type of accident Andrew and Piggy had is among the most common in horse racing, and it can lead to nothing more than a few scrapes and bruises or it can prove fatal for one or both parties. Andrew's level of injury is pretty common. 
> 
> Also, Dippin Dots kind of freak me out, so if you're a fan, more power to you.
> 
> And ads;lfkjas;lfkja; your comments have been absolutely amazing! I love hearing what you think and going on the journey with you. I'm a little late responding, work has been murder, but I'll hopefully get to it in the next few days!


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Neil gets the ride on Queenie, and a new chapter of his life begins.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't think there are any warnings or definitions for this chapter. Once again I want to thank Gabrielle for hosting this enormous RBB festival, and @tntwme for the beta. Check out the final one of Fornavn's incredible pieces that inspired this story!
> 
> Also if you're not familiar with it, [this](https://open.spotify.com/track/6dGnYIeXmHdcikdzNNDMm2) is the song Neil sings.

Neil wasn’t sure what swayed Kevin in the end, if it was Andrew or Wymack or the five pound weight allowance apprentice jockeys got.  The one thing he was absolutely certain of was that it wasn’t him. For all Kevin had been the one to set him on this path—more like shove him, really—now it was quite obvious that he would rather have had a trained monkey on his horse than Neil.  He came to every morning workout, every race, critiqued every stride.

It was getting harder and harder to sleep at night.  As soon as his head touched the pillow he would start replaying his races with Kevin’s voice in his ear.  He wished for a distraction, but Queenie couldn’t help him and it wasn’t fair to ask this of Andrew. Andrew wasn’t even coming to the track half the time, and when he did he was leaving partway through the day.  Neil understood; he knew what kind of pain he must still be in, the toll that took. But in the dark of his dorm, he would admit to himself that he missed him. Not just the kisses, though kissing Andrew was one of the highlights of his life, but all of it.  The conversations, the weird jokes, the sitting side-by-side on the roof watching calm settle over the grounds. Maybe Andrew was done with him; maybe he was just another hookup. It wasn’t like Neil had ever really expected to be anything more. Wanting and expecting were two different things.

The day before the race, they loaded Queenie onto the van.  As Neil settled into the passenger seat, Wymack dropped that morning’s newspaper onto his lap, sports’ section on top, before turning the key in the ignition.  Andrew was watching as they pulled out of the stable area. He was coming too, in Kevin’s car and on Kevin’s insistence. Neil would never admit how relieved he was when Kevin had told him.  Andrew was always better than no Andrew, even if Kevin meant it as a slight on Neil’s abilities.

Neil idly flipped through to the racing section as Wymack got the van on the road.  He almost choked when he found it: an interview with Kevin sat next to the column about the betting for the day.  In it, he talked about his breeding program, his hopes for Queenie and the three yearlings he’d held back from the sales this year.  But that wasn’t what got Neil’s heart racing:

 

 

> _Kathy Ferdinand: Andrew Minyard has been The Raven Queen’s only jockey since you moved her to Foxhole Racing.  What are you going to do now that he’s out for the next six to eight weeks?_
> 
> _Kevin Day: I’m fortunate that Foxhole has such a talented up-and-coming rider like Neil Josten to take over the ride from him.  Queenie is a bit opinionated, and Neil has been working closely with her since Wymack signed him._
> 
> _Kathy Ferdinand: Yes, he’s been having quite a lot of early success._
> 
> _Kevin Day: He has, and it’s not unexpected if you know him.  I have high expectations of him, and hope to have him riding for me long into the future._

He shook his head and dropped the paper on the floor of the van.  Kevin was so full of shit, it was infuriating. How he could say that stuff to a reporter, and then act like Neil was worse than useless...it made his head spin.  After a few minutes, he snatched the paper back off the floor, meaning to re-read the interview, but a photo from a different section caught his eye and he froze.

The page rattled when his shaking fingers touched it, and he clenched his teeth, willing himself to stillness.   **ARRESTS MADE IN GANG CASE.**  It was a benign enough headline; most people would glance at it and flip the page to the comics section.  But the mugshots were unmistakably Lola and Romero Malcolm.

He scanned the article; it contained little information, other than their names and the fact that they were arrested for fraud.  Go figure, that it would be something so petty that would take them down. He should feel relief, or maybe smug satisfaction, but all he could register was numb disbelief.

Neil let the paper fall into his lap and stared out the window at the South Carolina countryside flying by, verdant and unfamiliar.  He had never spent time in this state when on the run, never come this far east. He still wasn’t sure what had led him to try to hide out in Florida, where Lola and Romero had finally found him.  Maybe it was the false sense of security, being a thousand miles south of his dead father. Maybe it was the hardship of dealing with winter without paperwork, without a job, without hope; squatting in unheated houses until he was desperate enough to consider anything to get out.  

Maybe if he believed in fate, he’d have called it that.  

“You okay, kid?” Wymack’s gruff voice interrupted his thoughts.  

“Yeah.  Just thinking.”

Wymack grunted.  “Well, don’t strain anything, I don’t have another jockey to take your place.”

Aiken was buzzing when they arrived.  It was a small track, mostly running claimers and cheap allowances and schooling races.  This week was the the most important of the year, with two ungraded and one graded stakes.  It was timed to coincide with some sort of horsey festival, and they drove carefully through an array of vendors and demonstrations.  Neil’s stomach had been uneasy since he had first caught sight of Lola’s picture in the paper, and now it was full-on rioting.

The stable area was quieter, just the normal bustle of horses and grooms, riders and trainers.  Kevin’s car pulled up next to the van, and Nicky piled out of the backseat to start prepping the stall.  Queenie came down the ramp befitting her name: tail high, neck arched, blowing and snorting at the unfamiliar surroundings.  She pulled this act at every new place. Neil couldn’t help but chuckle at her as she pranced up the row.

He settled them both down by taking her for a long walk, letting her look at the grounds.  He remembered where he’d found a patch of grass the last time he’d been there, and let her snatch a few mouthfuls before tugging her head up and leading her back to the stall.

That night he was pacing his room, debating about going for a run just to try to settle his thoughts, when he heard a rap on his door.  A glance through the peephole showed Andrew standing there, looking bored and vaguely annoyed. Neil let him in.

“Figured I’d come and see how badly you’re self-destructing,” Andrew said, dropping onto the edge of Neil’s bed.

“I’m fine.”  The look Andrew gave him was loud in its silence.  

“What do you say to her?” Andrew asked.  Neil looked at him quizzically. “When you’re riding Queenie, you’re always talking to her.”

“Oh, that.”  He let himself fall back onto the bed and looked up at Andrew’s face.  He hadn’t shaved in a few days, and his beard was coming in, dusting his jaw in dark gold.  “I sing to her.”

“You sing.”

“Yeah.  My mother had me do that when she first taught me to ride.  To make sure I was breathing, she always said.”

“What do you sing?”

“Depends.  A lot of oldies.  Bob Dylan, the Rolling Stones.  Sometimes Queen. She likes the Beatles the best I think.  Hates Elvis.”

Andrew laughed, a quiet sound, quickly gone.  It was the first time they’d been alone together since Andrew had gotten back, and Neil was abruptly aware of that fact.  There were a thousand things he wanted to ask him, to say, but his brain could think of nothing but the way Andrew’s hands felt on his skin.

Something of the kind must have shown on his face.  “Yes or no, Neil?”

It was awkward at first, with the cast and the sling.  Andrew’s bruises had mostly faded to yellow and green, but even after Andrew said it was okay Neil was afraid to touch him.  Yet it was such a relief, burying his fingers in that fine hair, feeling the scrape of teeth on his lower lip, the soft sigh of breath across his skin.  

It was slower, somehow.  Andrew was slower. Neil wasn’t sure if it was the cast, or the ribs, or something else entirely, something that echoed in his own heart.  He surrendered himself to the slowness, and found himself drifting so deep he wasn’t sure if he would find his way back to shore. If he would ever even want to.

*****

Andrew lay awake for hours after he should have been asleep.  If Neil woke up and caught him, he’d say it was the pain. It wasn’t a lie; his ribs ached and his arm ached and he itched in places he couldn’t scratch.

But it wasn’t the truth, either.

He listened to the near-silent music of Neil’s breathing, felt his warmth radiating next to him like the rising sun burning off the fog, and he couldn’t bring himself to close his eyes against the glow.

*****

The morning dawned bright and clear, the sultry air a promise of an unbearably hot day.  Nicky set up fans in Queenie’s stall, while the rest of them sought refuge in the air conditioned clubhouse.  It was weird, watching the earlier races on a television screen. Restlessness beat at Neil’s skin to the drum of hoofbeats on dirt.  He wanted to be out there, to prove he deserved to be. That he wasn’t just a ghost, wasn’t the nothing he had been for a dozen years until he stumbled into that stall.

Getting ready was muscle memory by now.  Pull on his breeches, his boots. Tug the silks over his head, then clip on his helmet.  Grab his saddle and the pads for underneath. Step on the scale. The small slips of lead, added to the pockets in the weight pad.  Step off. The walk to the paddock.

At the first glimpse of the copper gleam of her haunches and the brilliant white of her markings, his nerves started to twist his stomach again.  Wymack took the saddle from him and tacked her up, talking the whole time. Neil nodded along; he already knew the plan, but he couldn’t stop his hands from shaking.  Andrew stepped up behind him, shoulder brushing his; Neil wanted to lean back into his solid weight but didn’t let himself. “I thought you were fine,” Andrew murmured in his ear.

Neil almost laughed.  Before he could reply, the call came for riders up.  He bent his knee and Wymack hooked a hand under his shin and lifted him into the saddle.  Queenie craned her neck around, touching her nose to his boot. Sweat was already beginning to darken her coat, and he rubbed the damp patch and took a deep breath.

“Just another race,” Wymack said, leading them out to where the pony riders waited.  Neil repeated that to himself as he trotted down the track, rising and falling to the rhythm of the words.  

They had drawn the outside post, number ten.  It wasn’t ideal, as they’d have more ground to cover, but Neil had faith that the filly had the speed and the stamina to make up for it.  The number four jockey, sitting on a leggy bay in the black and red silks of Nevermore, ended up next to him. “So this is how Kevin Day is going to explain it.”

Neil kept his mouth shut; trash talking was something all jockeys did, and most of the time he ignored it.  

“Get a load of this kid, acting like he’s too good to talk to us.”  The jockey laughed. “At least now he’ll have an excuse, when the filly sees some real competition and burns out like the waste of oats she is.”

“How are you going to explain it to Moriyama when a rookie kicks your ass on a horse he called worthless?” Neil asked.  The man’s reply was lost in the clanging of the gate as his horse was loaded, and then an attendant took Queenie’s bridle and loaded her in.

They had a clean break, and after a few strides Neil eased Queenie towards the rail, settling along the outside midway along the pack.  She was running easily, ears pricked, already pulling at Neil’s soft hold but not insistent yet. A gap opened up in front of them, but it was too soon, and Neil held her steady, singing softly to her, a Beatles song his mother used to sing in the car sometimes when the road was empty and the sun was shining.  

They swept into the first turn a bit too wide, slipping back into sixth in the pack.  It took every ounce of willpower not to send her forward, but he could hear Andrew’s voice in his head mocking him for his impatience.   _“Little darling,”_ he sang, _“the smiles returning to the faces.  Little darling, it feels like years since you’ve been here.”_

The pack began to thin out as they galloped along the backstretch, and Neil asked Queenie for a little bit more.  She lengthened her stride, quickly passing the chestnut who was running just ahead of them. _“Here comes the sun, here comes the sun.”_  

A horse swerved in front of them, narrowly avoiding a bump.  It was the Nevermore filly, and the jockey switched his whip hand, bringing the crop down just in front of Queenie’s face.  A few months ago, she would’ve freaked out at the close call; but her stride never faltered. _“And I say, it’s all right.”_

The bay filly and Queenie took the second turn in sync, gaining steadily on the two horses ahead of them who were now dueling it out.  Neil’s chance was fast approaching. He had to time it right; otherwise they’d run out of track or Queenie would run out of steam. Three more strides.  Two. The Nevermore rider swung his whip and his horse leaped forward just as Neil dropped down on Queenie’s neck.

_“Sun, sun, sun, here it comes.”_

Queenie pinned her ears back and dug in like she hadn’t already run seven eighths of a mile.  The Nevermore horse had just caught the leaders, but Queenie flashed past all three of them. For a few strides, the bay filly tried valiantly to keep up.  Neil could feel Queenie toying with her, and then the other horse’s stride faltered. Queenie’s ears swept up and she bounded forward again. Neil stood up in his stirrups as they reached the wire, three strides in front.

Convincing Queenie to slow required more negotiation than Neil was hoping for.  His arms were jelly after keeping his filly in check for the better part of a mile.  Eventually she came back to him, and he breathed a sigh of relief as he turned towards the paddocks.  He wanted to crawl into bed and pull the covers over his head; he wanted to go back to the beginning and ride the race all over again, to memorize every stride.  

He could hear Nicky cheering, and he felt his smile split his face.  Wymack greeted him with a fierce grin, and even Kevin met his eyes with a warmth Neil hadn’t realized the man could possess.  And Andrew...Andrew was looking at him with a heat that promised an interesting evening.

It was long past dark when they got back to Palmetto.  Even Queenie was tired, content to walk along at Neil’s shoulder as they went for a stroll to stretch her legs.  Andrew fell in at Neil’s other side, a silent presence that somehow kept him on his feet.

Once Queenie was settled, Neil followed Nicky and Andrew to the car, getting in the backseat and feeling a little jolt of surprise when Andrew did the same. Nicky drove around to the dorms.  Aaron was waiting by the entrance, and Neil was confused for a moment until he realized Katelyn lived there too.

Neil made to get out, but Andrew stopped him with a hand on his arm.  The hand slid down to briefly grasp his, leaving something behind. Neil held it up to the streetlight that was filtering through the car’s windows.  A key, on a small chain.

“Come back with us.”  There was no inflection in Andrew’s voice, but it was weighty nonetheless.

“Wait, what?” Nicky asked, looking at them in the rear view mirror.  “You mean…you two...”

“Fucking finally,” Aaron muttered, and Nicky smacked him on the arm.

“You knew?”

“You didn’t?  Are you blind?”

Nicky opened and closed his mouth soundlessly for a minute, then put the car in drive.  “I hate this fucking family. Nobody tells me anything.”

The car was filled with Nicky and Aaron’s bickering for the short drive, but Neil was too tired to care.  When they pulled up to the house, Andrew walked straight through and out to the back deck. They were far enough away from the city that the stars were visible, and Neil dropped onto the bench that was the lone seat, staring up at them.  He felt strangely unmoored.  Everything that had connected him to his old life, all the familiar terror and loneliness, had been slowly snipped away, and it seemed a miracle that he didn't just drift off into the sky, a piece of dandelion fluff carried by the whims of the winds.

“Thank you,” Neil said, when Andrew settled next to him, solid and honest and _real._  “I don’t think I could’ve done this without you, any of this.”

Andrew huffed, and let his arm brush Neil’s, setting off goosebumps.  “It was just a race, Neil.”

But that wasn’t what Neil meant, not really.  All his life, he had been running, until Andrew had told him to stay.  This, this was different. It wasn’t a race; it was coming home after; it was friends, and a key.  It was a horse, and a name, and Andrew. Above all Andrew. He slipped his right hand into Andrew’s left, and leaned against him when he felt Andrew’s fingers lace with his.  He thought maybe—maybe this was hope.

Hope had always seemed like a trap, something only fools could afford to have because they were too stupid to know better.  But right now, Neil wondered if maybe it was more like the sun. Sometimes you couldn’t see it, hidden behind clouds and rain and the inexorable turn of the earth, but it was always there, whether you believed in it or not.

_Sun, sun, sun, here it comes._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I can't believe it's finally the end of this fic! I hope you all have enjoyed reading it as much as I've loved writing it. Your comments have been amazing, as much as I write for myself, knowing that it's reaching other people is more rewarding than you can imagine. Please spread the word if you liked it, and check out the other fics for the RBB, there is some incredible work out there! If you want to come say hi or yell or just celebrate that it's done, HMU on [my Tumblr.](https://fuzzballsheltiepants.tumblr.com)

**Author's Note:**

> I hope you enjoyed this beginning! I plan to post Tuesday, Thursday, and Sunday for the next couple weeks. Please check out Fornavn's blog, all her art is amazing! Comments and kudos mean more than you can imagine! Feel free to HMU [on Tumblr](https://fuzzballsheltiepants.tumblr.com) if you have questions or just wanna chat.


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